The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has today, 7 November, approved the merger between the two leading UK health software application and services firms iSOFT and Torex.
The OFT attached no conditions on the merger, plans for which were first announced in July 2003. Assuming the deal is approved by Torex shareholders the new firm will have a combined worth of over £700m.
Both iSOFT and Torex are bidding for major contracts under the current National Programme for IT in the NHS, where their respective applications and services are being bid by many of the local service provider consortia bidding for regional NHS IT contracts.
Together with US-based Cerner and IDX, iSOFT is one of the three main providers of large-scale clinical systems expected to win signicant contracts under the NPfIT.
A spokesperson for iSOFT told E-Health Insider that the offer documents will now be issued to shareholders as soon as possible - this is due within 21 days.
After the offer documents have been issued there will then be an Exceptional General Meeting, due within 23-24 days - at which Torex shareholders will decide on whether to except the merger offer.
The terms of the deal are a merger paid for in shares, with each Torex share representing 1.7692 new iSOFT shares. The new merged company will trade under the name of iSOFT and have iSOFT's current chief executive Patrick Cryne as its new Chairman.
Related story:
ISoft and Torex Announce Merger Plans
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