The Department of Justice has reached a settlement in its litigation regarding ASSA ABLOY AB’s proposed $4.3 billion acquisition of Spectrum Brand Holding’s Hardware and Home Improvement division.
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The proposed settlement requires ASSA ABLOY to divest assets as a condition of finalizing ASSA ABLOY’s transaction with Spectrum Brands Holdings, Inc.
Under the terms of the proposed settlement, which is subject to court approval, ASSA ABLOY must divest assets to Fortune Brands Innovations, Inc. that are designed to allow Fortune to compete in the markets for premium mechanical door hardware and smart locks used in residential and multifamily buildings.
These assets include ASSA ABLOY’s EMTEK and Schaub premium mechanical door hardware businesses, its Yale and August residential smart lock businesses in the United States and Canada, and other assets for multifamily smart lock applications in the United States and Canada.
Additional terms of the settlement include: expanding Fortune’s intellectual property and commercialization rights in smart locks, inclusion of additional residential mechanical lock assets, the appointment of a monitoring trustee, a penalty provision for delayed transfer of a manufacturing facility, and the ability, under certain circumstances, for the Department to seek additional relief later if the divestiture fails to maintain the intensity of competition that existed before the merger for smart locks used for residential and multifamily buildings.
ASSA ABLOY AB is a publicly traded Swedish stock company headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. It sells its residential door hardware products in the United States under the August, EMTEK, and Yale brands.
Spectrum Brands Holdings is a publicly traded Delaware corporation headquartered in Middleton, Wisconsin. It sells its residential hardware products in the United States under the Baldwin and Kwikset brands.
Fortune Brands Innovation is a publicly traded Delaware corporation headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois. It sells various products for the home under the Moen, Fiberon, and MasterLock brands, among others. ■
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