Tata ready for fresh offer for Corus

London, Jan 15 (UNI) The Tata Group is reported to be readying for a fresh offer for the Anglo-Dutch Corus steel plant, setting up the end of January as the last date for offers set by the Takeover Panel.

On the other hand, the city sources said a new offer by the company will be made within a week. Most do prefer the Indian group to the Brazilian CSN.

A Sunday paper said Tatas will outbid the 5.9 billion dollars offer on the table from CSN.

Mr Ratan Tata has to decide on a new offer until the end of January, but the expectation is that he is preparing to increase his offer to 550p a share, well above the 515p bid from CSN's Chairman Benjamin Steinbruch and will make it known soon, possibly later this week. This was reported by the Observer.

Earlier, Tata had offered 455p for Corus, raising it later to 500p. Corus management was ready to welcome the Indian group when CSN raised its own offer to 515p.

Corus shares have been trading at well above the CSN offer price and closed on Friday up 4p at 540p. This is due to the almost sure believe that a fresh bid will come soon, much before the end of the month.

The only doubt is that as there are major expansion plans of Tata in Asia itself the group would not enter in a bidding race any further if CSN outbids it again.

The merger with either Tata or CSN would create the fifth largest steel group in the world with a combine output approaching 24 million tonnes of steel a year.

UNI