Micro D Calls Buyout Bid ‘Inadequate’

Micro D rejected Tuesday a $37-million buyout offer from its majority shareholder, Ingram Industries Inc., as inadequate.

Santa Ana-based Micro D, the nation’s largest wholesaler of personal computer products, said a special three-member committee appointed to consider the Ingram offer determined that the $12.50-a-share offer was too low.

William Lomicka, an outside director of Micro D, said the company “expects further dialogue with Ingram in the near future.”

Ingram, a Nashville, Tenn.-based conglomerate that owns nearly 60% of Micro D’s stock, last week offered to buy the rest of the company. Ingram officials could not be reached for comment late Tuesday.

In an interview earlier this week, Ingram Chairman E. Bronson Ingram said his company was interested in a “negotiated transaction” but would consider other options.

“We really haven’t tried to determine what we’d do in the event (the offer) failed,” Ingram said. “We’d like to do it aboveboard and friendly. We’re going to try very hard to do that.”

Securities analysts have said they expect a higher offer for Micro D from Ingram or another party.

Ingram, one of the nation’s largest privately held firms, owns companies involved in marine transportation, oil and gas exploration and insurance. It is also a distributor of books, magazines, videotapes and personal computer products.