INA Holding Schaeffler KG has announced that it is now the controlling shareholder in FAG Kugelfischer AG.

INA is privately held and its owner, Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler, has purchased 5% of the outstanding shares of FAG Kugelfischer AG.

Her shares, combined with the those acquired by INA itself over the past three weeks, put INA-controlled holdings at well over 25% of FAG's outstanding shares.

INA now owns enough shares that it can block any anti-takeover or hostile efforts by FAG's supervisory board.

FAG has been indicating it was working its existing relationship with NTN into a "white knight" arrangement to thwart the INA bid or make an alternative bid higher than INA's 11 Euro per share offer.

However, INA's Managing Director Juergen Geissinger said, "I can't imagine that NTN will make a higher bid, considering that we're by now a main investor. Schaeffler will continue to buy shares and we'll keep expanding our contingency."

In response, FAG pointed to INA's secretive business operations, "FAG's management demands from INA's management to give up its transparency blockade in its information policy."