By Anton Bridge
TOKYO (Reuters) -U.S. private equity fund KKR said on Monday it has asked Fuji Soft to make a court filing to stop what it said was Bain Capital’s violation of a non-disclosure agreement amid Bain and KKR’s acquisition battle for the software maker.
In a letter to Fuji Soft, KKR asked the Japanese company to file an injunction to halt Bain Capital’s “continued breach of its non-disclosure agreement”.
KKR and Bain are trying to buy Fuji Soft in competing tender offer bids worth as much as $2 billion.
The request by KKR ramps up the acrimony between two of the biggest names in global private equity in their tug-of-war for Fuji Soft.
Fuji Soft and Bain declined to comment.
It is notable that the contentious scramble is playing out in public in Japan – a market where hostile bids have only become more common in recent years and where most takeovers are still done on a friendly basis.
New takeover guidelines introduced by the industry ministry to spur corporate takeovers have begun to remove the long-held stigma around unsolicited bids and encouraged lenders to finance such proposals.
Fuji Soft’s board has come out in support of KKR’s lower bid and demanded that Bain destroy the confidential information it compiled during due diligence, but Bain proceeded with its bid, now hostile, saying there was no reason for its higher offer to be rejected.
Bain has said Fuji Soft is disregarding the interests of shareholders and that it wanted to continue using the information to launch its tender offer. Fuji Soft’s founding family has said it supports Bain’s bid.
