Paris (AFP)

Veolia wants to work extra hard to close its takeover bid for Suez at the start of the fall, which admitted Tuesday to have resolved to a "compromise" after not having been able to "escape" the attack led by its rival.

The two brothers, enemies of water and waste treatment, ended an eight-month showdown on Monday, via an agreement in principle which provides that Veolia absorbs a large part of Suez.

"The way has been cleared with the agreements, and even the pace is accelerated, because the collaboration between the teams of Suez and Veolia will make it possible to deal more quickly with all the procedures vis-à-vis the competition authorities", estimated Tuesday Antoine Frérot, CEO of Veolia who led the battle to swallow Suez.

"The solution that we are proposing resolves the competition problem and therefore I think that at the end of June we will have the list of remedies desired by the competition authority. And therefore the takeover bid could be closed at the beginning. of the fall, "he said.

For his part, the director general of Suez, Bertrand Camus, estimated Tuesday that it took "another year to complete this operation".

Speaking for the first time since the agreement reached with Veolia, he admitted that his group had to make "a compromise, everything is not perfect, but it was time to come to this solution".

Referring to the raid led by his rival, Bertrand Camus said: "we fought with the clear determination to escape it. At one point, reality prevailed, in particular the fact that they were able to acquire 29.9% de Suez, which was a very important step and which has changed the data of this takeover somewhat from the start ".

But the director general of Suez also put forward that "what was very important is that after these 7-8 months of battle, we manage to sit down and find a compromise".

- "we move on to the future" -

Same tone of appeasement in Antoine Frérot: "the time of confrontation is behind us, we move on to the future. It is the time of construction, of rapprochement".

The boss of Veolia has listed the five major industrial projects in which the new merged group will seek to invest.

Recycle plastic;

ensuring air quality in schools, supermarkets, department stores and offices;

"capture" carbon to fight emissions;

build a "large electric battery recycling plant";

and finally launch a major project linking "energy-agriculture-food": "how to feed with less water, less energy and less soil", said Antoine Frérot.

"We have to look to the future", also admitted Bertrand Camus.

The agreement reached between Suez and Veolia "preserves their French anchoring" and "gives clarity to the employees", greeted Tuesday on France Culture the governor of the Bank of France François Villeroy de Galhau, who said to speak as than "citizen".

"Dialogue is always a better solution to settle economic problems than invective," he said.

The agreement reached provides in particular for four years of maintaining employment and social benefits in the new Suez, ie what will remain of the hundred-year-old group once a large part of its assets have been bought by Veolia.

Veolia will acquire a large part of Suez's international activities for a total turnover of 37 billion euros.

At the same time, the future Suez, largely focused on France, will be taken over by majority French shareholders and will be less than half the size of the current group, i.e. around 7 billion in revenues out of the 17 billion recorded in 2020. .

© 2021 AFP