Philips NV’s talks with Dutch systems house BSO/Beheer BV, announced last November (CI No 1,308), have culminated in agreement to form a systems integration joint venture, BSO/Pass International. Philips has taken a 15% stake in BSO and is planning to increase its holding, although not to the point where it has control. BSO has bought back the 25% of its shares held by Oce Van der Grinten NV; the rest of the equity is now held 56% by BSO staff with the balance shared by a bank and a venture capital fund. Philips already accounts for nearly 90% of BSO’s business: BSO looks to be doing $250m a year by 1993, after $90m this year, by which time Philips should account for only 40%. The new BSO/Pass will be able to call on 1,000 staff in 10 European countries, the US, Latin America and the Far East, many of them coming from existing Philips operations in those countries. It will go after major customers in industry, banking, government and transport.
