Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant is clear that the company still wants to acquire Syngenta.
In Monsanto’s quarterly earnings conference call Wednesday, Grant appealed to Syngenta’s grassroots level to help advance merger talks with Monsanto.
“I would continue then to encourage the shareowners to appeal to their board to simply engage in constructive discussions with us regarding our very attractive proposal,” said Grant, “one that we believe has the best interests of our customers, our respective shareowners and society in mind.”
Grant expressed confidence that the combined companies can do great things together. He says Monsanto currently reaches 400 million of the world’s three-and-a-half billion acres of arable land, but population growth requires that more be done.
“To fully address the demands for food production, we need to deliver technology and insights to every acre and every farmer from large-scale operations in the Americas, to small holder farmers in Africa,” said Grant.
Syngenta, headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, has rebuffed three offers to be bought by the St. Louis-based Monsanto.
Addressing the value of a merger to Monsanto and Syngenta shareholders, Grant said that joining the companies will improve growth and enhance upside potential for both.
“The two companies together,” said Grant, “are more valuable than the two alone.”
Source: www.brownfieldagnews.com