 |
Indaba Capital Management, which opposes Stagwell’s revised offer for MDC Partners, criticizes it as a “sweetheart transaction.”
ICM managing partner Derek Schrier dismisses the $100M enhanced bid as “insufficient” and “a small and arbitrary number” when compared to MDC’s $1.8B valuation.
In his June 8 letter to Stagwell CEO Mark Penn, Schrier questions the independence of three directors nominated June 7 by Stagwell for board seats since “they all appear to have professional overlap with you.”
He wrote: “Stagwell seems to be trying to stack the board of directors with your allies and former colleagues. As a potential minority shareholder in the newly combined entity, we find this lack of true independence alarming.”
He urges Stagwell to come up with a credible offer, “rather than continuing to issue press releases ad nauseam and trying to spin shareholders.”
ICM “is ready and willing to engage with you to determine what it will take to earn Indaba’s vote,” wrote Schrier.
MDC’s shareholder meeting is scheduled for June 22.
Stagwell's PR units are SKDKnickerbocker and Sloane & Co, while MDC owns Allison+Partners, Veritas, Hunter and KWT Global.
QVC Group is using Joele Frank for strategic communications as the TV home shopping pioneer declares Chapter 11.
Publicis Groupe reported 4.5 percent Q1 organic growth in net revenues to $4.1B despite the volatile macro environment.
PondelWilkinson, the Los Angeles-based IR and strategic communications shop, has expanded to the East Coast by adding Anreder & Company veterans following the retirement of principal Steven Anreder.
Teneo represents American Ocean Minerals Corp as its merges with NASDAQ-listed Odyssey Marine Exploration to create a $1B deep-sea critical minerals research and mining platform that is under US-control.
Kekst CNC represents Cleveland-based Everstream as the business-only fiber network receives bankruptcy court approval for the sale of almost all of its operations to Bluebird Fiber for $385M.
