The State Transportation Board (STB) reported that it will announce on May 8 whether the new merger application between Union Pacific (UP) and Norfolk Southern (NS) is complete in order to proceed with the proposed transaction.
“The board will determine the completeness of the reviewed request; such comments should address only whether it is complete, as comments on the merits of the proposed transaction will be sought at a later stage of the proceedings if the board accepts the request,” the agency said.
He specified that applicants can submit a response addressing any comments on integrity before May 12 , so that an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) can initially resolve all disputes for an efficient procedure.
“Interested parties should file any discovery motions as soon as possible to allow the ALJ to resolve discovery disputes expeditiously, and it may rule on any motion on the effective date of this decision,” he explained.
Following this comment and response period, the STB will make a decision on the completeness of the document , either accepting it as complete or rejecting it as incomplete. This determination should not be confused with a determination on the substance of the proposed transaction. If the STB accepts the document, it will issue a procedural timetable for comments on the substance of the proposed transaction.
Similarly, the STB required applicants to redesignate the Company Disclosure Annexes as public.
For its part, the railway company BNSF reported that it is carefully reviewing the application submitted by UP-NS, which covers approximately seven thousand pages.
“Although our review is still in its early stages, the fundamental premise of the proposed merger appears unchanged. For that reason, we continue to have serious concerns that this transaction is not in the best interests of customers, competition, or the freight rail network as a whole—concerns shared by many other industry stakeholders and government officials,” said Tom G. Williams, the firm’s executive vice president and chief marketing officer.
He commented that if STB accepts the request, it will act quickly to establish a formal procedural timeline , one of the main reasons being the deadline for clients and interested parties to submit a Notice of Intent to Participate.
However, he reiterated that they will provide more information and additional clarity on the procedural review established by STB, once they review the document.
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