Multiband tells $4.50-a-share suitor to get lost; stock falls back

A day after its stock skyrocketed 23 percent, Multiband Corp. of New Hope confirmed in a government filing that it had rejected an $89 million unsolicited cash and stock takeover bid from Pennsylvania-based UniTek Global Services.

Multiband stock, which had closed at $3.36 a share on Thursday, up 62 cents, dropped 10 percent Friday to close at $3.02, down 34 cents. The offer was for $4.50 a share.

Details of the would-be deal emerged Thursday in a government filing by AWM Investment Co., one of Multiband's largest shareholders, which urged Multiband to reconsider the UniTek offer.

But Multiband CEO James Mandel said in an interview that the UniTek offer is dead as far as he's concerned.

"There is no current offer, the original offer was rejected and there is nothing else," Mandel said.

UniTek officials could not be reached for comment.

Multiband, which wires apartments and homes for DirecTV and also provides voice, data and video networking services, said in its filing that its board had rejected the UniTek offer as inadequate, partly because of "the financial condition and operating history of UniTek."

Unitek, which provides telecommunications engineering, construction management and installation services to telecommunications companies, lost $30.6 million last year on revenue of $402.2 million. It has about 3,300 employees.

"The offer was unsolicited, and the company is not for sale," Multiband said in the filing.

The AWM filing included what the fund's managers said was the original June 8 letter to Multiband's Mandel and Chairman Donald Miller from UniTek Chairman Peter Giacalone. The letter outlined the terms of the offer, which it described as a 40 percent premium over the June 7 closing price of Multiband stock.

The AWM filing also included its own e-mail to Mandel and Miller last Tuesday, in which supported the UniTek bid and noted that the offer was at that point a 60 percent premium over the Multiband stock price.

"We believe that pursuing the UniTek proposal is the only option consistent with the fiduciary duties owed by the directors to the company and its shareholders," the AWM e-mail said. "We request that you immediately begin discussions with UniTek," which, it added, probably would be willing to negotiate a higher acquisition price.