Hitachi and NEC seek up to $2.1 billion through Renesas share sale

By Scott Murdoch and Anton Bridge

(Reuters) -Hitachi and NEC Corp are aiming to raise up to $2.1 billion by selling their stakes in chipmaker Renesas Electronics, according to a term sheet seen by Reuters, joining a Japanese restructuring drive that has boosted shares.

Investors have welcomed measures to improve capital efficiency at Japanese companies, sending share prices to 34-year highs.

Companies have been spurred on by the Tokyo Stock Exchange, which this month published a list of companies that had disclosed plans to improve capital efficiency and is expected to put pressure on them to deliver.

Hitachi and NEC will sell a combined 123 million Renesas shares in an offer price range of 2,474 yen ($16.76) to 2,528 yen, the term sheet showed, representing a discount of about 6%-8% to Renesas's closing price on Thursday.

NEC said the sale was in line with its efforts to reduce cross-shareholdings. A Hitachi spokesperson confirmed the company planned to sell its Renesas shares. Renesas declined to comment.

The chipmaker was created in 2010 from a merger of NEC's chip division and Renesas Technology, which itself was established through a merger of the chip operations of Hitachi and Mitsubishi Electric Corp.

In November Japanese state-backed fund INCJ sold all but a token portion of its stake, having steadily sold down the 69% of Renesas it acquired in a rescue deal in 2013.

($1 = 147.6100 yen)

(Reporting by Scott Murdoch, Disha Mishra, Anton Bridge and Sam NusseyEditing by Rashmi Aich, Varun H K, Mark Potter and David Goodman)