Toshiba to buy 20% stake in nuclear power-plant company

PanARMENIAN.Net - Toshiba Corp. is in talks to buy out Shaw Group's 20% stake in nuclear power-plant company Westinghouse Electric Co. LLC, people familiar with the matter said, a move that could wipe out any U.S. ownership of the 125-year-old American company, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The discussions come roughly five years after Shaw, a Baton Rouge, La., engineering-services company, partnered with Toshiba and another Japanese company to buy Westinghouse from British Nuclear Fuels PLC for $5.4 billion.

In October 2006, Toshiba paid about $4.2 billion for 77% of Westinghouse, whose roots date back to 1886. Shaw agreed to buy one-fifth of Westinghouse, issuing $1.08 billion of bonds in a private placement to do so. Another Japanese company, Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries Co., owns the remaining 3%.

Shaw was one of four minority partners recruited to join the deal, and was supposed to take a 5% stake, while Toshiba took 51%. After two of the investors, Japan's Marubeni Corp. and Fluor Corp. backed out of the deal, Toshiba and Shaw upped their stakes. As part of its agreement, Shaw had the option to sell all or part of its 20% stake to Toshiba before the six-and-a-half-year maturity of the bonds.

Although talks are still ongoing, they could fall apart, the people cautioned. Representatives for Westinghouse couldn't be reached for comment. Toshiba and Shaw declined to comment. Westinghouse Electric provides fuel, technology and equipment to utilities for commercial nuclear power use. Nearly one in every two nuclear power plants in operation around the globe is based on Westinghouse technology, according to the company's website. The company is headquartered near Pittsburgh, Pa.

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