Total of France and private equity firm Hellman & Friedman plan to sell their 30 percent stakes in Gaztransport & Technigaz (GTT), the world’s largest maker of storage tanks for LNG tankers.
Shareholders will formally lodge a request to go public with the French authorities in the second half of this year, Reuters reported, citing an unidentified source as saying.
“ Total is less likely to remain a GTT shareholder. As for Hellman & Friedman, the logic of private equity firms is that they go in and out ,” the source said.
The same source said GTT had been valued at between 1.3 and 1.8 billion euros.
GTT was formed in 1994 by the merger of the two major players in the field of LNG membrane containment systems: Gaztransport and S.N.Technigaz resulting in a cumulative experience of more than 80 years in the field of cryogenics and storage of liquefied gases.
GTT’s two main areas of expertise are cargo containment systems (CCS) for LNG carriers and land storage of LNG.
[mappress]
LNG World News Staff, June 26, 2013; Image: GTT