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Europcar branch at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport (archive photo)
Photo: Charles Platiau / REUTERS
The EU Commission has given a consortium led by Volkswagen the green light to take over the car rental company Europcar.
The group announced that the final condition precedent of the takeover bid was thus fulfilled.
The Europcar shareholders now have until June 10 to accept the offer.
If not enough shareholders decide to take this step, the deadline can be extended by a further ten days.
Volkswagen wants to take over more than 90 percent of Europcar.
If this threshold is exceeded, the offer price will increase by one cent to 51 cents per share, it said.
Together with the asset manager Attestor and the Dutch mobility provider Pon Holdings, VW is offering 2.9 billion euros for the car rental.
»Several hundred millions« in investments
So far, the consortium has secured 68 percent of Europcar.
The responsible VW board member Christian Dahlheim said that the company favors the squeezeout, in which the remaining minority shareholders can be pushed out of the company from a certain stake, "but it is not mandatory".
Even with the 68 percent, Volkswagen can make all business decisions in the consortium.
At the same time, Dahlheim announced investments.
“We assume that several hundred million will have to be invested to bring the infrastructure up to date.” However, these would have to be invested from Europcar's cash flow.
As a platform for car rental, ridesharing and car sharing, Europcar is to become the leading mobility provider and thus go well beyond the previous car rental offering.
Competitors are the car rental company Sixt and the mobility services of the Now Group, which have since been sold to Stellantis.
VW sees a strategic advantage in the combination of car rental and other mobility services.
Many observers believe that providing mobility services is becoming more important to automakers than selling vehicles.
However, Daimler and BMW have just withdrawn from this area.
mamk/Reuters