Staples to Buy Office Depot Consumer Business

Staples to Buy Office Depot Consumer Business

Following its attempt to buy Office Depot in January, Staples proposed to purchase Office Depot’s consumer business on June 4.

According to the letter sent to the board of Office Depot, Staples outlined a $1 billion offer — or $18.27 a share — for Office Depot’s consumer business, which includes the Office Depot chain of stores and OfficeMax.

According to www.nytimes.com/, this latest offer, which is all cash, comes at a roughly 43 percent premium to the 30-day average of Office Depot’s share price as of June 2, 2021.

Staples and Office Depot have tried tie-ups before in hopes of gaining scale and becoming the country’s singular office supply store. But the retailers abandoned efforts to combine in a $6.3 billion deal in 2016 after the Federal Trade Commission sued to block the proposed merger on antitrust grounds.

The retail landscape has changed significantly since then, given the rise of Amazon and other online retailers. Staples sold itself to the private equity firm Sycamore Partners in 2017 for $6.9 billion.

Staples filed for antitrust approval to acquire Office Depot’s consumer division in November in hopes of clearing the path for such a deal. It said it had made “substantial progress responding to the governmental data and document requests issued in connection” with that process.

Staples tried to buy all of Office Depot for more than $2 billion in January, but Office Depot rebuffed those efforts. Office Depot’s business-to-business unit comprised about half its $10 billion in sales last year.

Related:

• Staples and Office Depot Have Another Crack at Merging
• Office Depot Responds to Staples Offer

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