Courtesy of Benzinga.
ChinaEdu Corporation (NASDAQ: CEDU) (“ChinaEdu” or the “Company”), a leading online educational services provider in China, today announced that its board of directors has received a preliminary, non-binding proposal letter dated June 20, 2013 from Julia Huang, executive chairman of the board of directors and Shawn Ding, CEO of the Company (collectively, the “Buyer Parties”), to acquire all of the outstanding ordinary shares of the Company not currently owned by the Buyer Parties and certain other shareholders of the Company who may join the Buyer Parties, including ordinary shares represented by the Company’s American depositary shares, or “ADSs” (each representing three ordinary shares of the Company), at a proposed price of $2.33 in cash per ordinary share, or $7.00 in cash per ADS, subject to certain conditions.
According to the proposal letter, the acquisition is intended to be financed by debt and/or equity capital and the Buyer Parties have been in discussions with one or more financial institutions which have expressed interest in financing the proposed acquisition. Furthermore, the proposal letter specifies that the Buyer Parties’ proposal constitutes only a preliminary indication of its interest, and is subject to negotiation and execution of definitive agreements relating to the proposed transaction. A copy of the proposal letter is attached hereto as Exhibit A.
The Company’s board of directors intends to form a special committee of disinterested directors to consider the proposal and cautions the Company’s shareholders and others considering trading in its securities that the board of directors has just received the proposal and has not made any decisions with respect to the Company’s response to the proposal. There can be no assurance that any definitive offer will be made by the Buyer Parties or any other person, that any definitive agreement will be executed relating to the proposed transaction, or that this or any other transaction will be approved or consummated.
