The battle with Yahoo! management may be over, but Carl Icahn--in
some form or fashion-- remains in the news. A quick glance at Monday's
stories shows that Icahn remains the prime mover in some of the biggest
deal news of the day: ImClone Systems Inc., Motorola Inc. and WCI.
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The financier is the chairman of biotechnology company ImClone, which refused Bristol-Myers Squibb Co.'s $4.5 billion offer
on Monday for 83% of the company it doesn't already own. Now Imclone is
reportedly considering splitting into two parts, leading some to wonder
if this is just part of Icahn's efforts to exact more money from the
big pharma.
While he's trying to maneuver one company for a higher
offer, Icahn is steering another, WCI, through
bankruptcy. Icahn is also the chairman of the luxury home builder that
filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday. With about $2.18
billion in consolidated assets, WCI becomes the largest homebuilder to
file for bankruptcy this year, narrowly topping Tousa Inc.'s Jan. 29
Chapter 11 filing, according to The Deal's BankruptcyInsider.com. It
remains to be seen whether Icahn WCI will become an Icahn portfolio
company; he has shown his usual savvy by purchasing or investing in
various bankrupt companies in the past, including Federal-Mogul Corp.,
GB Holdings Inc., WestPoint Stevens Inc., TransTexas Gas Corp., XO
Communications and TransWorld Airlines Inc.
Finally, there is Motorola, a telecommunications equipment company trying to restructure
to save itself. Icahn is not even a board member, but he has a 7.6%
stake and has waged proxy battles with management in the past. In some
sense, Motorola's recent hiring of former Qualcomm Inc. exec Sanjay Jha
as CEO of its cellular phone business resulted from Icahn's prior
efforts at the company to force a restructuring.
So while others head out for sumer vacations, Icahn remains busy--maybe because he doesn't play golf.
-- Matthew Wurtzel
See earlier story about Motorola's restructuring from Tech Confidential
See earlier story about Imclone from Corporate Dealmaker
See story about Icahn's distaste for golf from Dealscape
