Ball To Sell US Steel Food & Steel Aerosol Assets, Form JV With Platinum Equity

(RTTNews) - Ball Corp. (BLL) and Platinum Equity announced that they entered into joint venture and definitive purchase agreements to form Ball Metalpack, a new packaging company that manufactures steel containers for aerosol products, food, household consumables, pet food, nutritional and other products in the United States. Platinum Equity will own 51 percent of Ball Metalpack and Ball Corporation will own 49 percent.

Ball Corporation will contribute its U.S. steel food and aerosol packaging manufacturing assets to the joint venture. These include the following tinplate steel assets: Canton (Brookline and Warner Rd.) and Columbus, Ohio; Milwaukee and Deforest, Wisconsin; Chestnut Hill, Tennessee; Horsham, Pennsylvania; Springdale, Arkansas, and Oakdale, California. In 2017, these U.S. tinplate steel assets had sales of $746 million and comparable operating earnings of $48 million. Jim Peterson, who currently manages those assets, will act as CEO of the joint venture.

In return, Ball Corporation will receive more than $600 million in pre-tax proceeds from the transaction and will retain a 49 percent interest in Ball Metalpack, for a total value of approximately $675 million.

Ball Corporation will continue to wholly own and operate its aluminum aerosol packaging facilities in the U.S., Canada, Europe, India and Mexico, and its steel aerosol facilities in Argentina, as well as the Findlay, Ohio, metal packaging facility, which largely produces aluminum beverage containers. The Findlay, Ohio facility will continue to produce two-piece steel food cans for Ball Metalpack under a long-term supply contract.