Diebold Nixdorf hires financial advisers to identify potential buyers

Diebold Nixdorf hired Credit Suisse and Evercore last week to help identify potential buyers, CNBC reports.

According to people familiar with the matter, no deal is assured and talks with potential buyers aren’t advanced. The unnamed sources added that it is too early to determine a price for the company.

Diebold forecasted a lower-than-expected EBITDA earlier this month and said it would use cash on hand and tap its revolving credit line to buy $160 million of Wincor Nixdorf shares, the German company Diebold bought in 2016. Shares have been in a freefall since. Diebold shares have fallen about 75 percent from $21.50 to less than $5 over the past 52 weeks. Diebold had annual revenue of $4.6 billion in 2017.

Diebold acquired Wincor two years ago but not all of Wincor’s shareholders tendered the offer. At the end of July Diebold only held 77 percent of the outstanding shares. 13 percent of the remaining outstanding holders asked to be paid earlier this month, about $255 million. Diebold paid $160 million and will pay the balance later this week. Diebold will then own more than 90 percent of outstanding shares.

The report says that Diebold had access to $380 million in funds under its revolving credit facility at the end of the second quarter.

“The company is in constructive and productive discussions with its lenders regarding its future financial flexibility and expects to reach a resolution in the near-term,” Diebold noted in the statement Monday. “The company will disclose additional details in due course.”

The sources say Diebold is looking for a buyer now and is focusing on private equity firms and rival NCR. Bain Capital may also be interested as Bain and Blackstone had previously discussed partnering on a deal for NCR in 2015. Representatives from Bain and NCR declined to comment.

A Diebold spokesman declined to comment on the sales process, but added, “As a global leader in our industry, we have the scale and capacity to evolve alongside the markets we serve and continue to bring our customers innovative services and solutions.”

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