FRANKFURT (Reuters) - The administrators and creditors of collapsed Dutch engineering services firm Royal Imtech (>> Royal Imtech) pressed on with the forced sale of its businesses to raise funds to settle its bills.
The sale of the German unit started on Tuesday, with insolvency administrator Peter-Alexander Borchardt saying he had already received more than 40 expressions of interest.
Imtech Germany filed for insolvency on Aug. 6, and the parent company followed suit a week later, capping a long slide that began in 2013 after accounting irregularities were uncovered at its Polish and German operations.
The group has since hastily sold operations representing 43 percent of its revenues. The German business accounts for another 21 percent, or 860 million euros ($952 million).
The trustees of Imtech said its shareholders would not receive any of the proceeds from the sale, with all the money going towards paying off creditors.
The banks sold part of division Imtech Traffic & Infra to RCPT Beheer on Tuesday, which the trustees said would secure almost 2,000 jobs. The business provides services for road and rail transport and public lighting.
A sale of parts of unit Imtech Benelux is also expected soon.
The trustees said payments to trade creditors of Imtech Traffic & Infra and the previously sold Imtech Marine and Imtech Nordic totalling 143 million euros were now secured and a 120 million-euro bank guarantee was not at risk.
Imtech Germany's insolvency administrator aims to sell the business as a whole, but at least some of the possible bidders have expressed an interest in only parts of it, a spokesman for Borchardt told Reuters.
Several people familiar with the sales process said Imtech Germany's services business was especially likely to spark interest as it is quite profitable.
They said mainly companies in the construction sector were eyeing Imtech Germany. Germany's Bilfinger (>> Bilfinger SE), which has some overlapping business with Imtech, declined to comment on whether it was among the companies that have expressed interest.
Ernst & Young [ERNY.UL] has been hired to organise the sale of the German unit.
(Reporting by Alexander Huebner; Additional reporting by Toby Sterling in Amsterdam; Writing by Maria Sheahan; Editing by Keith Weir)
