Report: Armstrong Plans to Squeeze Out Minority sh

Bietigheim-Bissingen, Germany, September 6--Armstrong World Industries, the US flooring group, according to German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, is planning a squeeze-out of minority shareholders in its German subsidiary Armstrong DLW, in which it now holds a 96.42 per cent stake. The German company, which pursued an ambitious diversification policy in the early 1990s, subsequently returned to its core activities following failure to achieve the desired success with furniture. It showed a loss of 26.5m euros for the first half of 2005. A change on the management board has been announced, with Thomas Diepenbruck to take over as head of finance with effect from September 1, and the new team faces the task of solving the company's many difficulties. However, it is thought that this will prove a challenging task in view of factors including pressure on margins, overcapacity on the market and high raw material costs.