Waterford Wedgwood said 13 Oct/08 that it had raised EUR 79.6M from shareholders as part of an "open offer" fundraising. This was EUR 22.09M below the group's original target in the stock offering. It means that a large number of shareholders will now have their holdings in the company diluted. A company spokesman said it would now increase the level of funding being sought as part of its planned "placing" of shares, which is scheduled to be completed by 30 Nov/08. The group will seek to raise EUR 74.1M from institutional investors as part of the placing to bring the total raised to EUR 153.7M. At an EGM in Dublin on 13 Oct/08 to seek approval for the changes to its shareholder structure, Waterford Wedgwood's CFO Anthony Jones said it had made 30 presentations to potential institutional investors in the past 3 weeks to progress the placing. As part of the open offer, chairman Sir Anthony O'Reilly and his brother-in-law Peter Goulandris, who is Waterford's deputy chairman, committed to buy stock worth EUR 60 million. Other investors made commitments worth EUR 15 million. This included Corporate Partners Interests, a private equity fund managed by a division of investment bank Lazard, which subscribed for its full entitlement of about EUR 9.7 million. It also subscribed for an additional "excess entitlement" of about EUR 5.3 million. Killian Murphy, an equity analyst with Goodbody Stockbrokers in Dublin, said he was not "overly optimistic" that the luxury goods company would be able to raise EUR 153.7 million. But he said the latest funding from shareholders was important for the company. "They'll have working capital going into the key Christmas trading period, which they didn't have last year", he said. "That's clearly a positive. Christmas will be a key period for them. The consumer slowdown in the US will impact them". Waterford Wedgwood's planned disposal of its Rosenthal ceramics division in Germany has been put on hold until after its placing of shares has closed. Recent reports have suggested that the Irish company has received interest from seven parties and is seeking EUR 130-150 million for its German subsidiary.
