The European Commission has given the green light for the acquistion of Stora Enso's Maxau magazine paper mill by PHO P, a newly founded company owned by Germany's Schwarz group. The deal worth €210m was announced in mid-September and the Commission was notified of the proposed takeover in late October this year.
According to the Commission, the transaction was examined under the simplified merger review. The Commission cleared the transaction concluding that "the proposed acquisition would raise no competition concerns, given the limited vertical links between the companies' activities."
The Maxau mill in Karlsruhe, Germany runs two paper machines with an installed production capacity of up to 530,000 tpy of supercalendered (SC) paper.
Schwarz is mainly active in food retailing in over 30 countries through its retail chains Lidl and Kaufland. Through its subsidiary Prezero, the group is also active in the collection, recycling and commercialisation of recovered paper and other secondary raw materials.
