Cevian swoops for stake in Swedish seat belt maker Autoliv

STOCKHOLM: Activist investor Cevian Capital sees strong potential in Sweden’s Autoliv after taking a stake worth around $850 million in the world’s biggest maker of airbags and seat belts.
Cevian, whose portfolio includes large positions in European blue-chips such as ABB, Ericsson and Thyssenkrupp said it backed Autoliv’s plans to split into two listed companies and saw upside in both businesses.
“We believe that the separation of (electronics arm) Veoneer and the creation of two focused companies is logical and will realize significant value,” Cevian Managing Partner Christer Gardell said in an emailed comment.
“We are not talking about 10-20 percent upside, but significantly more,” he added.
Shares in Autoliv, which plans to split into two listed companies, were up 1.1 percent at 1130 GMT compared with a 2.6 percent drop in the STOXX Europe Automobiles & Parts Index. Cevian said late on Thursday it owned 6.9 percent of the outstanding shares in Autoliv, which has a market value of more than 103 billion Swedish crowns ($12.50 billion).
Autoliv said last year it was planning to split into two listed companies, with one focused on high-tech safety gear such as radar products and vision systems to target growth related to advances toward self-driving vehicles.
Autoliv has also been winning new business for products such as airbags and seat belts from Japanese rival Takata, which has been at the center of the auto industry’s biggest-ever recall and filed for bankruptcy last year.