logo
Ito Family's Seven & i Gets Back To Basics To Ward Off $47 Billion Takeover Bid From Circle K Owner

Ito Family's Seven & i Gets Back To Basics To Ward Off $47 Billion Takeover Bid From Circle K Owner

Forbes7 days ago

KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP via Getty Images
This story is part of Forbes' coverage of Japan's Richest 2025. See the full list here.
Facing activist investors and an unsolicited bid of nearly $50 billion from Canadian retailer Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT), Seven & i Holdings, owner of the 7-Eleven convenience store chain, announced measures in March to improve profitability.
ss
They include a ¥2 trillion ($14 billion) share buyback through 2030; plans to list its U.S. 7-Eleven stores in 2026; and the sale of non-core retail assets to U.S. PE firm Bain Capital for ¥815 billion. Ito family heir, Junro, son of late founder Masatoshi, was promoted to chairman from vice president and retail veteran Stephen Dacus was brought on board as the company's first non-Japanese CEO.
The $69 billion in revenue ACT, which has about 17,000 Circle K and other stores globally, was reported to have initially made a $39 billion bid for Seven & i last August before revising it upward in January.
Seven & i, which had roughly 87,000 outlets worldwide and revenue of nearly ¥12 trillion in the year through February, rejected the improved offer but in May agreed to open its books to ACT. Any deal would be one of the largest foreign takeovers of a Japanese company.

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Supplier Astemo Seeks To Deal With Automotive Industry's Future
Supplier Astemo Seeks To Deal With Automotive Industry's Future

Forbes

timean hour ago

  • Forbes

Supplier Astemo Seeks To Deal With Automotive Industry's Future

Logo for Japan's Astemo automotive supplier Japan's Astemo Group and its Astemo Americas unit are making major adjustments amid changes in the auto industry. Astemo Americas is at work related to new technology, including steer by wire, break by wire, and autonomous driving. Astemo Group is looking to do an initial public offering in 2026. Currently, the company is 40% owned by Honda Motor Co., 40% by Hitatchi Ltd., and 20% by private equity. The U.S. unit, Astemo Americas, is looking to expand from its Farmington Hills, Michigan, complex. It changed its name to Astemo Americas last month. 'We're growing out of this facility,' said Tim Clark, CEO and president of Astemo Americas. 'We're bursting at the seams.' The executive said the supplier's new quarters will remain in the greater Detroit area. The company is looking for a site that could include an actual test track, rather that doing test drives in a parking lot. Astemo has 80,000 employees globally and 14,000 in the Americas. Its customers include Honda, Volkswagen AG, and General Motors Co. The supplier provided a briefing on Friday to automotive journalists. With the planned IPO, there's the question whether Astemo's relationship with Honda may change. 'We are very close to them,' Clark said of Honda. After the IPO, 'I don't think that will change…It's a very good relationship.' What follows are other topics discussed by Astemo Americas: --China's decision to limit rare earths to the U.S.: 'I think magnets are affecting almost every auto supplier,' said Rob Sharpe, senior vice president of sales and marketing for Astemo Americas. The impact on Astemo Americas? 'Not yet, but soon,' Sharpe said. 'We're counting the days.' An April 27 story on the Forbes website said, 'Rare earths are the great multiplier in the production of electricity and the efficiency of motors. Without them wind turbines would probably not be worth constructing — rare earths increase the output from a wind turbine fivefold or better and the same dynamic is at work in the efficiency of motors.' --Tariffs: The administration of President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs of 25% on imported vehicles and parts. Tariffs are levied on importers of products. Typically, those costs are passed on to customers. Tariffs are not paid from one country to another. 'The tariff is no fun,' Clark said. 'I wish it were gone.' He added: 'We are looking to see where we can localize' parts. The briefing included media test drives of vehicles with Astemo technology. The cars and trucks were production models equipped with prototypes of Asemto tech.

Stock Movers: Warner Brothers Discovery, Qualcomm, Starbucks
Stock Movers: Warner Brothers Discovery, Qualcomm, Starbucks

Bloomberg

time2 hours ago

  • Bloomberg

Stock Movers: Warner Brothers Discovery, Qualcomm, Starbucks

On this episode of Stock Movers: - Warner Brothers Discovery (WBD) shares rise after the company said it will split its streaming and studios business and its TV networks operations by the middle of next year. The streaming and studios company will include Warner Brothers Television, the Motion Picture Group, DC Studios, HBO, and HBO Max. - Qualcomm (QCOM) shares rise after the company reached an agreement to buy Alphawave for $2.4 billion. The offer equates to about 183 pence per share for Alphawave -- a 96% premium to the company's share price on March 31, the last trading day before Alphawave and Qualcomm disclosed the talks. - Starbucks (SBUX) shares rise after the company announced price cuts for a slew of its tea-based beverages at its stores across China. It's the latest campaign to appeal to Chinese consumers for non-coffee offerings during summer.

China shuts down AI tools during nationwide college exams
China shuts down AI tools during nationwide college exams

The Verge

time2 hours ago

  • The Verge

China shuts down AI tools during nationwide college exams

Chinese AI companies have temporarily paused some of their chatbot features to prevent students from using them to cheat during nationwide college exams, Bloomberg reports. Popular AI apps, including Alibaba's Qwen and ByteDance's Doubao, have stopped picture recognition features from responding to questions about test papers, while Tencent's Yuanbao, Moonshot's Kimi have suspended photo-recognition services entirely during exam hours. The increasing availability of chatbots has made it easier than ever for students around the world to cheat their way through education. Schools in the US are trying to address the issue by reintroducing paper tests, with the Wall Street Journal reporting in May that sales of blue books have boomed in universities across the country over the last two years. The rigorous multi-day 'gaokao' exams are sat by more than 13.3 million Chinese students between June 7-10th, each fighting to secure one of the limited spots at universities across the country. Students are already banned from using devices like phones and laptops during the hours-long tests, so the disabling of AI chatbots serves as an additional safety net to prevent cheating during exam season. When asked to explain the suspension, Bloomberg reports the Yuanbao and Kimi chatbots responded that functions had been disabled 'to ensure the fairness of the college entrance examinations.' Similarly, the DeepSeek AI tool that went viral earlier this year is also blocking its service during specific hours 'to ensure fairness in the college entrance examination,' according to The Guardian. We were unable to find any public announcements from the AI companies mentioned, with The Guardian reporting that news around the shutdowns is being driven by students on the Chinese social media platform Weibo. The gaokao entrance exam incites fierce competition as it's the only means to secure a college placement in China, driving concerns that students may try to improve their chances with AI tools.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store