Ukraine’s supreme court will begin hearing a challenge to Irish giant CRH’s ownership of a cement business in the wartorn country on September 11th.
Local building materials player Kovalska is challenging the Anti-Monopolies Committee of Ukraine’s (AMCU) decision to allow CRH buy Dyckerhoff, owner of two cement plants, saying the deal will damage competition.
The country’s supreme court will begin hearing the final round of the case on September 11th. The trial is likely to run over a series of sessions, sources say.
Kovalska maintains that CRH’s purchase of Dyckerhoff gives the Irish group up to 46 per cent of the market for cement in Ukraine, squeezing competition for a material for which demand is expected to soar.
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CRH has countered this and says its takeover of Dyckerhoff met all conditions set by the AMCU and complied with the law and international best practice.
[ Battle lines drawn in legal dispute over sale of cement maker in Ukraine to CRHOpens in new window ]
Kovalska won its original challenge to the mergers regulator’s decision in February, but lost on appeal.
That prompted it to go to the supreme court, whose ruling will end the litigation one way or the other.
CRH sold 25 per cent of Dyckerhoff in June to Divinereach, a company controlled by Hyundai Ireland supremo Eugene O’Reilly and his family.
The AMCU required CRH to offload the stake to an independent third party as a condition of allowing the Irish group buy Dyckerhoff.
A statement issued by Divinereach in Ukraine this week confirms the O’Reilly family’s involvement.
“The company is controlled by the O’Reilly family, which is a distributor for Hyundai Ireland and is also well known for its active investments in real estate and IT,” said the statement.
“They now view Ukraine as part of their investment portfolio.”
The fact that Divinereach is a recently-registered Irish company with no visible connection to cement manufacture sparked concerns in Ukraine.
The Confederation of Builders of Ukraine, where Kovalska chief executive Sergii Pylypenko is a director, wrote recently to Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Harris, highlighting Divinereach’s involvement.
The organisation’s president, Lev Partskhaladze, sought more information about the company and pointed out that it had been registered only in March.
In the Republic, the O’Reillys have invested in property, building apartments recently in Deansgrange, Dublin.
They own shares in Rentalmatics, an Irish business developing software that manages fleets of rented vehicles, which has offices in Dublin and New York.
At the end of 2023, holding companies controlled by family members Eugene O’Reilly jnr, Susan Jones, Eva Sutherland and Rachel McAree had assets totalling about €76 million between them.
An O’Reilly-controlled property company, Fitzditton, had €10.6 million. The O’Reillys did not comment.
