Panasonic said it would spend at least €3.1 billion to take control of smaller rival Sanyo Electric, creating Japan's second-largest electronics maker behind Hitachi.

Major shareholder Goldman Sachs said it would tender its Sanyo stake to Panasonic.

The decision by Goldman, which had rejected Panasonic's earlier lower offers, came after the Wall Street firm reported its first quarterly loss since going public.

Goldman, Daiwa Securities SMBC and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking hold nearly 430 million of Sanyo's preferred shares, each of which can be exchanged for 10 common shares when a restriction is lifted in March.

If converted, Goldman and Daiwa Securities SMBC would each hold a 29 per cent stake in Sanyo, while Sumitomo Mitsui Banking would hold 12 per cent. The combined 70 per cent stake would be worth about €4.2 billion, based on the offer price of 131 yen.

Both Sumitomo Mitsui Banking and Daiwa Securities SMBC said they are positively considering tendering their stakes in Sanyo to Panasonic, formerly known as Matsushita Electric.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.