AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals AB, Sweden, whose Indian arm's delisting process has now encountered a further possible delay from the Indian bourses because of the minority shareholders who had filed a petition in the Bombay High Court to block the move.
This is despite the fact that its public shareholders had approved the proposal to delist the company from the Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange.
To a query from Pharmabiz on its next move following the stalling of the delisting process by its minority shareholders, the parent company AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals AB said in its email response, "We are responding to the petition in accordance with our rights and obligations under the Indian judicial process."
It was on May 26, 2013, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals AB, Sweden mandated offer for sale (OFS) of the shares of its subsidiary AstraZeneca Pharma India Ltd to get the shares of the Indian unit delisted. But India’s market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), stated that there was need to keep a close watch on the entire delisting process only then it would approve the same after being convinced that the procedures were transparent.
Pharmabiz had earlier reported that even though the AstraZeneca Pharma India had completed the formalities of the delisting process, SEBI's suspected that the multinational drug major could have bent a few rules, connived with a foreign investor, the Elliott Group, in order to sail through the delisting. The Hong Kong-based Elliott Group which is a foreign institutional investor had picked up a large chunk of shares amounting 94.02 per cent through the OFS, and currently holds 15.52 per cent of shares in the company.