China's biggest ever foreign takeover has cleared its last major hurdle.
ChemChina said Friday that about 80% of the shares of Swiss pesticides and seeds giant Syngenta have been tendered in favor of the $43 billion acquisition, comfortably clearing the threshold for the deal to go through.
The takeover is more than double the size of any other foreign purchase made by a Chinese acquirer, according to data provider Dealogic.
China's most ambitious overseas deal yet will give the world's largest agricultural market more security in the supply of food for its huge and growing population. The companies plan to work together to upgrade Chinese agriculture during a period of rapid modernization aimed at increasing grain output and food quality.
Syngenta's shares will be removed from exchanges in Switzerland and the U.S. as soon as legally possible, the companies said Friday, with ChemChina expected to take full control on May 18.
The deal is a coup for Ren Jianxin, who co-founded an industrial cleaning firm in 1984 and grew it into ChemChina, a chemicals giant with revenues of $45 billion in 2015 and over 140,000 employees globally.
China's biggest ever foreign takeover has cleared its last major hurdle.
