The Commerce Commission has published a statement of preliminary issues relating to an application from Osmosis Buyer Limited (Osmosis) to acquire all of the shares in Firewall Holdings S.À R.L (Firewall) as part of a global transaction.
Osmosis owns Zenith Heaters Limited (trading as Zenith Water) and Firewall owns Waterlogic New Zealand Limited (trading as Merquip). Both Zenith Water and Merquip supply and service drinking water solutions in New Zealand; primarily multi-function taps that dispense instant filtered, boiled, chilled and sparkling water from a single outlet.
As part of its application for clearance, Osmosis has offered an undertaking to divest the entire Merquip business.
The Statement of Preliminary Issues outlines the key competition issues that the Commission considers important in deciding whether to grant clearance to the proposed acquisition.
