Porsche shoots German battery maker Varta to the rescue

Varta

You’ve probably held them in your hands: Varta’s blue-and-yellow-colored batteries.
The battery maker has been around since 1887, and was booming just a few years ago thanks to the popularity of wireless gadgets, all of which require batteries.
But rising costs left the company in trouble.
Last year, things got so bad that they had to cut 800 jobs, about 17 percent of the workforce.

Porsche

Varta is an important supplier to Porsche, producing batteries for the hybrid Porsche 911 Carrera through its subsidiary V4Drive Battery.
Porsche already had a significant stake in V4Drive, but now decides to go a step further by investing 60 million euros in Varta, thus assuring itself of a stable supply of batteries.
In return, Porsche, along with Austrian businessman Michael Tojner, who was already a major shareholder, will each receive about 32 percent of the shares.
Creditors, meanwhile, grab a solid 36 percent, and Varta disappears from the stock market entirely.