Two investors in ASMI Hermes and Fursa want to have their say in the offers currently floating around for the maker of equipment for chip production. The company stated it will form a Transaction Committee consisting of CEO Chuck del Prado and a member of the supervisory board. A monitor group will also be installed, which will consist of company founder Arthur del Prado, two members of the supervisory board and a representative which Hermes and Fursa can throw into the snakepit.

Arthur del Prado owns around 22% of the company, however this quite large chunk is a few percent short of the combined clout of hedge funds Hermes and Fursa. Del Prado senior handed over control to his son in March this year. The Del Prados (which rhymes nicely with The Sopranos) are currently battling to keep control of their company, after investors deemed they're doing somewhat of a bad job. The diverse parties are involved in a legal battle concerning preferred shares which were issued by ASMI to the Del Prados, thereby kicking dust in the face of the hedge funds who couldn't name their own candidate for the position of CEO.

US competitor Applied Materials recently bid for two business units of ASMI, namely those Del Prado senior built from ash to counter his rival. The offers were deemed to be not good enough, especially as the two units in question, namely the ALD (Atomic Layer Deposition) and PECVD (Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapour Deposition) activities, are supposed to bring ASMI healthy profits next year onwards. ASMIs stock price has been rising continuously as people believe the company is either going to be split up or sold in one big gulp. X