24 Apr 2023 09:51

Henkel closes sale of Russian assets

MOSCOW. April 24 (Interfax) - German chemical and consumer goods company Henkel has closed the transaction to sell its assets in Russia.

Henkel AG & Co is no longer the owner of Henkel Rus LLC, data from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities (USRLE) showed. As of April 21, this Russian company is wholly owned by Lead Holding Ltd., which is based in the United Arab Emirates.

Henkel said earlier that the Russian assets would be sold for 54 billion rubles to a consortium of investors that includes Ivan Tavrin's Kismet Capital, Elbrus Services and Viktor Kharitonin's Augment Investments. Elbrus Services owned by Elbrus Capital cofounder Dmitry Kryukov, sources told Interfax earlier.

The shareholder structure in the deal was not disclosed. According to the USRLE, these companies own Investment Solutions-4 LLC, with Augment Investment Limited ICLLC holding 71%, Kismet Capital Group LLC with 25% and Seychelles-based Elbrus Services with 4%. This ownership structure took shape in April; Kismet Capital Group was initially the company's sole founder.

Henkel decided to exit its Russian business last April and in early March the company said it would do so by the end of the first quarter. Henkel spun off its Russian business at the end of December 2022, and it began to operate independently under the name Lab Industries as of January 1.

Henkel, which has been working in Russia since 1991, owned plants in Perm, Saratov Region (Engels), Leningrad Region (Tosno), Stavropol Territory, Ulyanovsk, Novosibirsk and Chelyabinsk region and two in the Moscow area, in Noginsk and Kolomna, as of the end of 2022.

The Russian business generated about $1.06 billion annually for the German group, the chairman of Henkel's shareholder committee and supervisory board, Simone Bagel-Trah said in December. The company said in its report for 2022 that the write-off of the Russian assets cost it about 1.1% of global sales.

The company valued the assets offered for sale - the plants in Russia plus one in Belarus - at 673 million euros.

Henkel Rus LLC closed 2021 with net profit down to 7.48 billion rubles from 7.84 billion rubles a year earlier on revenue up 13.1% to 95.14 billion rubles to Russian Accounting Standards, data from the SPARK-Interfax showed. Figures for 2022 have not been published yet.