Dalton Investments Completes Sale of 11% Fujitec Stake to Riverbank Holdings Company, a Subsidiary of United Technologies

TOKYO and LOS ANGELES, Feb. 15 /PRNewswire/ -- Dalton Investments LLC today announced that it has completed the sale of an 11% stake in Fujitec Co., Ltd. , an elevator manufacturer based in Osaka, Japan, to a wholly owned subsidiary of United Technologies .

Under the terms of the agreement, Riverbank Holdings Corporation, a subsidiary of United Technologies, purchased 10,477,000 Fujitec shares for 695 Yen (US$6.50) per share, or a total value of 7,281,515,000 yen (US$68.05 million). Dalton, however, has retained approximately 4% of Fujitec's shares outstanding.

James B. Rosenwald, founder and managing partner of Dalton Investments, said, "While we are extremely disappointed that Fujitec's management never embraced Dalton's Management and Employee Buyout proposal, we are thrilled with the prospect of helping Fujitec's management enhance value for all shareholders. Fujitec is now well positioned to improve its margins, which currently are only 3%."

Mr. Rosenwald added, "We will make our best effort to work with current management in a collaborative way to improve operations and increase overall profitability, and we are hopeful that Fujitec's management will embrace future recommendations from us."

Dalton proposed a Management and Employee Buyout to Fujitec's management on April 23, 2007, offering to purchase all outstanding Fujitec shares for 900 yen (US$7.60) per share, a 10.6% premium at the time. With approximately 93.6 million shares outstanding, the total value of the offer was approximately 84 billion yen (US$711 million).

Dalton Investments is a registered investment advisor with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm currently has $1.1 billion in assets under management and serves institutional and private clients. Dalton offers seven investment strategies, including Japanese management buyouts, Japan equity long-only, Japan equity long/short, Greater China equity long/short, global small-cap equity long/short, global large-cap equity long/short and distressed mortgages. In addition, the firm's Dalton Advisors division offers institutional and private clients investment strategies using low-cost, tax- efficient funds to structure customized portfolios in separately managed accounts.