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IP/02/589
Brussels, 18 April 2002
Commission clears Wienerberger’s acquisition of the
brick activities of Hanson in Continental Europe
The European Commission has cleared an operation by which Wienerberger
AG of Austria acquires the brick activities of UK-based Hanson Plc in
Continental Europe through the acquisition of all shares of all subsidiaries of
Hanson active in this business. The transaction will have its main effects in
Belgium and the Netherlands and will enlarge the gap between Wienerberger,
the biggest brick supplier in these countries, and its competitors. But the
Commission has concluded that these markets will remain competitive given
the presence of other viable brick manufacturers and the importance of
imports.
Wienerberger is the world's largest brick producer with activities in all major markets
in Europe and USA.
It has entered into an agreement to buy Hanson Brick Kontinental Europa which
consists of a number of subsidiaries of the Hanson-group which all produce bricks
for wall building. The subsidiaries are located in Belgium (7 plants), the Netherlands
(10 plants), France (1), Germany (3) and Poland (2). Most of them produce facing
bricks while two make clay pavers and another two hollow bricks. The business
being acquired also includes eight trade-companies active in the sale of building
material - all of them located in the Netherlands.
The activities of Wienerberger and Hanson overlap mainly in the Netherlands and
Belgium. Considerable market shares arise in the facing bricks sector in both
countries as well as in bricks for load-bearing walls on the one hand and bricks for
non load-bearing walls on the other hand in Belgium.
But with regard to the Belgian markets the Commission's investigations found that
there exist a number of alternative suppliers of ‘façade’ bricks (also for load and non
load bearing walls) such as Swenden, Ampe and Ploegsteert and Vandersanden to
name (Vandersanden is only competitor for fassades) only the bigger players. In
addition, customers can choose alternative materials which are equally appropriate
for wall building, in particular for inner walls.
With regard to facing bricks in the Netherlands, alternative competitive suppliers
include HUWA, Rodruza and CRH. Imports, mainly from a range of suppliers in
Belgium, have also increased to a current 12-15% of total consumption from around
5% in 1990).
The Commission has recently carried out a number of merger investigations in
market for wall building materials including the Haniel/Fels ( IP/02/288 of
21.02.2002), Haniel/Ytong ( IP/02/530 of 9.4.2002) and Haniel/Cementbouw (which
is still going on, see IP/02/313