M&A market: Investors avoid automotive suppliers

Dusseldorf, Stuttgart The automotive supplier ZF is actually putting a lucrative division up for sale: the airbag and seat belt business. Sales are around 3.8 billion euros and the market share is 25 percent. By the end of next year, ZF intends to sell the business, which accounts for around ten percent of group sales. The foundation group wants to use the proceeds to reduce its billions in debt and invest in the transformation.

But: The time frame could be too short, the division could become a slow seller. “The market for the sale of company shares in the supplier sector is difficult at the moment. We currently see only a few interested investors,” says Klaus Rosenfeld, head of ZF’s competitor Schaeffler, the Handelsblatt.

Experts from financial circles are even more skeptical: For them, the market for takeovers and sales of supplier companies or supplier divisions is as good as dead. “There are no more sensible transactions. Even suppliers with a healthy business can no longer find buyers. The market is broken,” says an industry insider.