Toll Holdings

Infobox_Company
company_name = TOLL Holdings Limited
company_
company_type = Public (asx|TOL, nzx|TRH)
company_slogan = The total logistics solution
foundation = As a business - 1888
As a public company - 1993
As Toll Holdings - 1986
location = Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
key_people = Paul Little, CEO
Ray Horsburgh, Chairman
industry = Logistics
num_employees = 30,000 (2008)
products = in2store
Toll North
Toll Regional
QRX Transport
NQX Freight Systems
Toll Express
Toll Priority
Travcour
DX Mail
Toll IPEC
Toll Fast
Virgin Blue
Toll Personnel
Toll Transitions
Toll NZ
Toll Asia
revenue = $7.5 billion AUD ( 2006)
homepage = [http://www.toll.com.au/ http://www.tollgroup.com]

"TOLL" (asx|TOL, NASDAQ|THKUF), (nzx|TRH), properly "TOLL Holdings Limited", is Australia's largest transport company, based in Melbourne, Victoria. The company has operations in road, rail, sea and air.

For the fiscal year ending September, 2007, Toll reported net income of AU $1,278.7 million on AU $4.2 billion of sales revenue. It has many enterprise bargaining agreements with the Transport Workers Union, covering its road transport and warehouse distribution operations.

Timeline

* 1888 The company was founded in Newcastle, Australia.
* 1960 After the death of its founder, Albert Toll, the company was sold to National Minerals Limited.
* 1985 The company became Toll Transport
* 1986 A management buyout team led by Paul Little and Peter Rowsthorn takes control of the company.
* 1993 Listed as a public company on the Australian Stock Exchange
* 1995 Various acquisitions of Australian transport companies, including parts of Brambles Transport, JN Transport
* 1997 Acquired TNT Logistics TNT.dn
* 1998 Purchases IPEC.
* 1999 Sales growing by 52%, attaining major contracts with the distributors of Coca Cola
* 2001 Acquired Finemore Holdings
* 2001 Acquired Autotrans Car Transport based in Western Australia
* 2001 Acquired Wesfarmers Transport based in Western Australia
* 2002 Partnership with Patrick Corporation for Pacific National rail
* 2003 Acquired New Zealand rail and trucking group Tranz Rail (now Toll NZ), and Tasmanian rail operator TasRail as part of Pacific National.
* 2005 Acquired New Zealand trucking company JD Lyons.
* 2006 Acquired Singaporean logistics company SembCorp Logistics (SembLog) [cite press release |url=http://www.toll.com.au/media/2006/331640.pdf |title=Toll’s Asian growth platform successfully secured |accessdate=2006-06-04 |date=2006-05-03 |publisher=Toll Holdings]
* 2006 Acquired Patrick Corporation after a long and acrimonious takeover battle.
* 2007 Announced proposed acquisition of Hong Kong based freight forwarder BALtrans Holdings as part of the company's continued expansion into Asia. [cite news |url=http://business.theage.com.au/toll-bids-for-hong-kong-freight-group/20071220-1i80.html |title=Toll bids for Hong Kong Freight Group |publisher=The Age]
* 2008 Acquired United Carriers based in New Zealand
* 2008 Acquired Extra Transport Melbourne

Feud with Patrick Corporation

From late 2005 until May 2006, Toll was embroiled in controversy over its attempt to takeover Patrick Corporation. In particular board meetings for the combined Pacific National rail project were used as slanging matches by Patrick and Toll directors. [cite news |publisher=John Fairfax Holdings |work=The Age |url=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2005/10/24/1130006061265.html |date=2005-10-24 |accessdate=2006-06-04 |title=PN board meeting runs off the rails |author=Philip Hopkins]

The process included several court cases brought by each side.

On January 19, 2006, the ACCC ruled that Toll cannot take Patrick over. [cite news |url=http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3544306a6026,00.html |title=Australian watchdog blocks toll bid for Patrick |publisher=Fairfax New Zealand |work=stuff.co.nz |date=19 January 2006 |accessdate=2006-06-24]

On March 13, 2006, the ACCC announced that it accepted Toll's proposed court-enforceable undertakings and would no longer object to the takeover. However the share markets appeared to require that a higher price would need to be offered. [cite web
url=http://today.reuters.com/news/articlebusiness.aspx?type=tnBusinessNews&storyID=nSYU000254&from=business
title=Australia's Patrick shares jump, Toll to revise bid
date=March 12, 2006
publisher=reuters.com
accessdate=2008-08-08]

On April 14, 2006, Toll announced that it would offer 0.4 Toll shares plus AU$3.00 for each Patrick Corporation share. The Patrick board unanimously accepted the revised offer. All ongoing legal proceedings between the two companies were to be dropped and Patrick would no longer acquire FCL Interstate Transport. [http://www.patrick.com.au/IRM/Company/ShowPage.aspx?CPID=747&PageName=Patrick%20and%20Toll%20Agree%20Terms] By purchasing Patrick, Toll will be the fourth largest transport company in the world and have annual revenues of over 8 billion [ [http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/toll-triumphs/2006/04/14/1144521508151.html Toll triumphs - Business - Business - theage.com.au ] ]

The takeover was finally successful in May 2006. Toll gained control of Patrick on 11 May 2006 [cite press release |url=http://www.toll.com.au/media/2006/334153.pdf |title=Toll takes control of Patrick and declares Offer unconditional |accessdate=2006-06-04 |date=2006-05-11 |publisher=Toll Holdings] and announced intent to compulsorily acquire the remaining shares in Patrick. [cite press release |url=http://www.toll.com.au/media/2006/338049.pdf |title=Toll Gains More Than 90% of Patrick & Will Proceed With Compulsory Acquisition |accessdate=2006-06-04 |date=2006-05-24 |publisher=Toll Holdings]

2007 Restructure and demerger

As part of the agreement with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission over the acquisition of Patrick, Toll was required to dispose of several assets. It sold Patrick's Bass Strait Shipping and Tasmanian Freight Forwarding businesses to the Chas Kelly Transport Group. [cite press release |publisher=Australian Competition and Consumer Commission |accessdate=2007-04-05 |date=8 March 2007 |url=http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/782207/fromItemId/2332 |title=ACCC allows Toll to divest Tasmanian Shipping and Forwarding businesses to Chas Kelly Group] It was originally required to also sell half of Pacific National. In 2007 however, Toll proposed a "variation" to separate Toll into separate logistics and infrastructure companies. Toll sought and received permission to retain complete ownership of Pacific National in the new Infrastructure Company provided that there was a complete separation of the boards and management of the two companies and all contracts between them were on an arm's length basis. [cite news |url=http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/toll-set-to-hold-pacific-national/2007/04/04/1175366327182.html |title=Toll set to hold Pacific National |author=Philip Hopkins |date=April 5, 2007 |work=Business |publisher=The Age |accessdate=2007-04-05]

ee also

* Toll Shipping

References

External links

* [http://www.toll.com.au/ Toll Holdings]
* [http://www.tolltransitions.com.au/ Toll Transitions]
* [http://www.tollnz.co.nz/ Toll NZ]
* [http://www.asciano.com.au/ Asciano]
* [http://www.autotrans.com.au/ Toll Autotrans]
* [http://www.pdltoll.com/ PDL Toll]