The owners of Technosila, one of Russia's largest home electronics retailers, plan to sell the company for $200 million or merge it with other market players, Vedomosti business daily reported on Wednesday, quoting sources close to the retailer.
A top manager at one of the market leaders, M.Video and Eldorado, confirmed receiving an offer to acquire all 100 Technosila outlets, but that his company was only interested in about 30 stores at a price of $20-$30 million.
Technosila's owners also have not found buyers among the regional electronics and home appliances retail store chains yet.
After myriad post-crisis problems, including bankruptcy cases among Technosila-related companies, the brand was acquired by businessman Mikhail Kokorich. The Technosila chain is now operated by the BiznesPro and ServisTrade companies, part of Kokorich's Dauria group.
The source close to the chain told Vedomosti that the company's debt burden was estimated at 16 billion rubles ($516 million). Technosila owes 12 billion rubles to banks and from four to six billion rubles to its suppliers.
Kokorich told the paper that chain's debt burden did not exceed $100 million.
