Corp. Express to open books for Staples bid: paper

AMSTERDAM/PARIS (Reuters) - Corporate Express CXP.AS will open its books to unsolicited bidder Staples (SPLS.O), a Dutch newspaper reported on Wednesday, but the U.S. office supplies company said it had yet to see any figures.

Staples on Tuesday raised its offer to 9.15 euros a share, or 1.7 billion euros ($2.65 billion) in total, on the condition that Corporate Express shareholders reject the company's plan to buy privately owned French rival Lyreco.

Lyreco said that was unlikely to happen, and its Chief Executive Eric Bigeard said Corporate Express shareholders could be persuaded to back the company's move last month to buy Lyreco for 1.73 billion euros.

"We remain convinced that shareholders will back our project," the Lyreco CEO told Reuters.

Staples has yet to see any detailed figures from Corporate Express, said the U.S. company's CEO Ron Sargent.

"That was news to us. At this point we haven't seen anything," said Sargent, who said he was in Amsterdam until Thursday seeking support from Corporate Express shareholders for his company's offer.

Het Financieele Dagblad reported, citing unnamed sources, that Corporate Express also would likely give a neutral recommendation to its shareholders about the Staples bid.

"Certainly, neutral is better than suggesting that shareholders vote for the Lyreco deal," Sargent said, adding that a recommendation for the Staples offer would of course be preferable.

Corporate Express, which will hold an extraordinary meeting of shareholders on June 18 to discuss the Staples bid and vote on the Lyreco deal, declined to comment, referring to Tuesday's statement.

It said on Tuesday it would carefully review the new bid and make a further announcement in due course, in contrast to its outright rejection of Staples' previous bids.

Analysts said Staples, which cannot raise its offer price again under Dutch regulations, has the best chances of getting Corporate Express shareholders' support because of its bid and because it has lowered the acceptance level to 51 percent from a previous 75 percent.

Staples said on Wednesday it had entered into agreements to purchase a total of 22.4 million ordinary shares in Corporate Express representing 12.3 percent of the company's outstanding ordinary shares at 9.15 euros a share.

Those agreements bring the total number of ordinary shares in Corporate Express now either owned by Staples or subject to irrevocable purchase agreements to 35.6 percent.

Holders of about 23.3 percent of Corporate Express, one of the world's largest wholesalers of office products, had previously committed to accept the offer, Staples said on Wednesday.

Asked whether any other shareholders had signed on, Sargent said: "We hope to talk to additional shareholders today and tomorrow. We're trying to convince shareholders that this is a compelling offer."

Other unnamed shareholders who own about 20 percent of Corporate Express also support the Staples bid, the paper said.

Shares in Corporate Express ended 0.8 percent higher at 9 euros, after the comments by the Staples CEO compared with a 0.1 percent rise in the morning. Amsterdam's blue-chip index .AEX closed down 1.1 percent.

Analysts have said a tie-up between Staples and Corporate Express would make strategic sense and could lead to big savings as both try to cope with a slowing U.S. economy.

Corporate Express's plan to buy Lyreco, a deal worth 1.7 billion euros and seen as a defense against Staples' takeover, would increase its margins and revenues and make it less dependent on the U.S. market.

Lyreco's Bigeard also revealed that Lyreco had considered raising debt to make a counter-bid for Corporate Express to save the tie-up but market conditions were not favorable.

Based in Valenciennes, north of France, Lyreco is Europe's biggest business-to-business distributor of office supplies and is controlled by Georges Gaspard, its founder and chairman, through an 84 percent holding.

(Reporting by Gilbert Kreijger and Reed Stevenson in Amsterdam, Astrid Wendlandt in Paris, editing by Will Waterman and Carol Bishopric)