Following the victory of the anti-merger faction led by brothers Lim Jong-yoon and Lim Jong-hoon, former presidents of Hanmi Pharmaceutical, in the proxy fight at the Hanmi Science shareholders’ meeting, the OCI Group declared the suspension of the merger process.
OCI Holdings, the holding company of the OCI Group, issued a statement right after the Hanmi Science general meeting on March 28, stating, “We humbly accept the will of our shareholders and announce that the merger process will be suspended.” The statement also expressed wishes for the future development of the Hanmi Pharmaceutical Group and confirmed that “there are no plans to revisit the merger.”
At the Hanmi Science shareholders’ meeting held at the Laviedor Hotel in Hwaseong City, Gyeonggi Province, earlier that day, all the proposals for the appointment of five directors nominated by the Lim brothers (with Lim Jong-yoon and Lim Jong-hoon being former presidents nominated as inside directors) were approved.
As a result, the Lim brothers’ faction will hold a majority with five out of the nine members of the Hanmi Science board of directors.
Lim Ju-hyeon, vice chairman of the Hanmi Group who pushed for the merger with OCI, and Lee Woo-hyun, chairman of OCI Holdings, were not appointed as inside directors.
After the announcement of the merger agreement between the Hanmi Group and the OCI Group on Jan. 12, Lim Jong-yoon, and Lim Jong-hoon, sons of Lim Sung-ki, the late founder of the Hanmi Group, have been in a management dispute with their mother, Song Young-sook, the chairman of the Hanmi Group, and their sister, Lim Ju-hyeon, the vice chairman, who led the merger initiative.