Thursday 22 April 2010
Dear Colleague
Today it has been announced that Deutsche Bahn, the largest German public transport operator, has made an offer to buy Arriva at 775p per share. Over a period of weeks we have negotiated hard with Deutsche Bahn, and the Board is unanimous in recommending the offer to shareholders. The full announcement can be read at www.arriva.co.uk.
In the mid 1990s Arriva took the decision to develop a pan-European business which would position the company well to benefit from the liberalisation of passenger transport markets. We are now in 12 countries and one of the leading private operators in most of those territories, helping passengers to make over 2.5 million journeys a day. Even though we are one of the leading private operators we still only have a tiny proportion of the market and therefore the potential for growth is significant.
The chief executive of Deutsche Bahn, Dr Ruediger Grube, also sees this opportunity, and the potential to build a strong international business. He and I both recognise the value of Arriva's senior management team and employees.
The plan is for Deutsche Bahn to build on Arriva's international platform and for Arriva's current management team to lead the enlarged group's regional and urban transportation business outside Germany.
Deutsche Bahn intends to ensure Arriva's continuity of top management, and high employee motivation. Its plans include maintaining our head office in Sunderland, under the existing management team, and keeping the Arriva brand.
For our shareholders who have invested in us and supported us over the years, this is an opportunity to receive a cash offer which fully recognises the current and future benefits of our strategy, and of the business we have built up.
For Arriva this is a great opportunity for our employees and management team to work with Deutsche Bahn and accelerate expansion in Europe, building on our leading position.
For our customers and passengers, it is business as usual and we look forward to continuing to serve them.
There are several stages to go through and conditions to be met before the offer can be implemented and the process is expected to take a period of some months. Our management team across all our divisions will be briefed over the next few days and will be in position to hold further briefings and start answering questions shortly. We will do our best to answer questions as they come up, though it may not be possible to provide an immediate and definitive answer for every question.
If you are asked questions by the media or other external stakeholders, please continue to refer them to Corporate Communications where they will be channelled to the most appropriate point.
David Martin, Chief Executive
Grimsby and Back
3 years ago
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