Samsung's $8 billion all-cash bid to acquire car tech manufacturer Harman may be approaching its first hurdle. The Wall Street Journal‘s reported that Atlantic Investment Managment, which has a 2.3% stake in the firm, plans to vote against the deal, saying that it's worth a lot more than the $112 per share the South Korean company is offering.
Granted, Atlantic Investment Management doesn't have a large enough stake in Harman to sway the votes and veto the deal, but it's possible that other — sizeable — shareholders will follow suit with the hope of squeezing a little bit more cash from the acquisition. Although, the probability of that happening is pretty low.
However, the possibility of another party placing a bid is now being thrown around. The Journal notes that Google's parent Alphabet and Apple are both eager to design the next generation of cars and with deep pockets, it would be foolish to rule out a potential bid from either of these companies in the not-too-distant future.
Atlantic Investment Management's estimation of Harman's worth likely comes from an acquisition that fell through in December 2015 when an unnamed company was offering to purchase the firm in an all-stock deal tworth $115 per share, but seeing as the offer was in stocks, it's unlikely that they could have beat Samsung's all-cash bid.
