SNT Group has re-emerged as the largest shareholder of Smac, a KOSDAQ-listed machine tool company. While SNT Group claims that the acquisition is for general investment purposes, the possibility of acquisition is being raised, given that the group has expanded through mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the past. According to the Financial Supervisory Service's electronic disclosure system on the 15th, Smac announced that its largest shareholder has changed to SNT Holdings and Choi Pyeong-kyu, the chairman of SNT Group.

It has been revealed that SNT Holdings and Chairman Choi steadily accumulated shares in the market from the 1st to the 14th of this month, even after it was known that they were registered as major shareholders of Smac at the end of last month. As a result, SNT Holdings increased its stake in Smac from 5.88% to 8.18%, while Chairman Choi raised his stake from 2.79% to 6.56%. The combined stake is now 14.74%, surpassing Choi Young-seop, the CEO of Smac (9.75%). Following this news, Smac's stock price surged over 10% in early trading but later reduced its gains, closing down about 0.9%.

Smac is expanding its business by acquiring the machine tool division of Hyundai Wia, the second-largest player in the industry, in partnership with private equity firm Rilson PE. Recently, it also acquired the 5G specialized network (Eum 5G) business previously operated by Sejong Telecom.

SNT Group has major subsidiaries including SNT Dynamics (defense, automotive parts, machine tools, etc.), SNT Motive (automotive parts, powertrain, etc.), and SNT Energy (heat exchangers, plant equipment, etc.). SNT Dynamics and SNT Motive were incorporated into SNT Group through M&A. Recently, SNT Holdings raised funds by issuing exchangeable bonds (EB) worth 90 billion won in partnership with private equity firm IMM Credit & Solution. They stated that part of the funds raised would be used for investments in other corporations.

[Reporter Woo Su-min]