Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd on Thursday decided to submit an offer for acquiring the tractor business of Valtra in Finland and Brazil.
The board, which met in Mumbai, has authorised the submission of an offer for acquiring the tractor business of Valtra Oy Ab, Finland and Valtra do Brasil Ltd, M&M informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.
The acquisition of Valtra would help M&M to broaden its product portfolio; the Finnish company makes high horse power tractors, while M&M is focused on the production of mid-end tractors.
At the recent annual general meeting, M&M officials had said that discussions were in progress with a Finnish company for a possible investment.
Valtra's parent company Kone had earlier stated that it would like to divest its stake in the tractor division to reduce debt and focus on other core businesses.
According to the information available on Valtra's website, the tractor business area develops, manufactures, markets and services tractors under the name Valtra and it was the market leader in the Nordic countries and ranked third in Latin America.
Valtra's net sales in 2002 was euro 762 million and it had 2,508 employees, including 1,541 in Finland and 710 in Brazil, it added.
