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Japan's Panasonic Corp. is considering buying its domestic rival Sanyo Electric Co. to become the nation's largest electronics manufacturer, news reports said Saturday.
Under the plan, Panasonic was to begin negotiations with the three top shareholders of the troubled electronics firm as early as this month, the Nikkei business daily, Jiji Press and Kyodo News reported.
The shareholders -- Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., the Daiwa Securities SMBC group, and the Goldman Sachs group -- hold a total of nearly 430 million preferred shares in Sanyo.
In 2006, Sanyo issued preferred shares worth 300 billion yen (3.1 billion dollars) to the three shareholders.
If converted into common shares, the shares would represent some 70 percent of Sanyo's outstanding issues in terms of voting rights.
Panasonic, which changed its corporate name from Matsushita Electric Industrial on October 1, hopes to secure a basic agreement with the three financial institutions by the end of the year, the reports said.
Through the acquisition of Sanyo, Panasonic hopes to boost its lithium-ion battery sales and newly-launched solar battery businesses, they said.
The combined projected group sales of Panasonic and Sanyo for the year ending March 2009 come to 11.2 trillion yen, surpassing the 10.9 trillion yen sales estimate for Hitachi Ltd., Japan's largest electronics manufacturer.
It was not possible to immediately confirmation the reports.
