The tender to buy Silesia coal mine located in Czechowice-Dziedzice did not take place last Friday, as planned. Instead, the procurement will be prepared again by PricewaterhouseCoopers.
“The tender will be held at the end of this month”, Artur Kosinski, Kompania Weglowa (KW) deputy CEO said.
The value of the mine has been estimated again and the asking price was set at PLN 114m (EUR 30.3m). The winner will be the company offering more, providing job to 1,000 employees and investing in new fields.
KW does not reveal potential buyers. “PB” has managed to find out that Czech CEZ has asked about the tender via its subsidiary. The company is looking for new mines because Czech coal stocks will end in 10-15 years. Silesia has about 200m tons of energy coal but PLN 300m must be invested to get to it.
Neither ArcelorMittal nor Czech OKD controlled by Zdenek Bakala are going to take part in the tender. A Swiss investment fund and a US company have applied to buy Silesia. British Gibson Group (GG) is also interested in the mine. On September 27th, the conditions of the tender will be published in press. The results of the tender must be approved by the supervisory board and general shareholders’ meeting, i.e. the Minister of Economy. Silesia might be sold as early as at the end of this year.
In June, Gibson Group promised privatization bonds worth PLN 1,000 per employee, keeping the jobs, USD 100-150m of investments and increasing annual capacity from 0.8 to 2m tons in 2013. The company signed agreement with trade unions however other potential investors have chances to acquire the mine as well.
(PLN 1 = EUR 0.266)