Put up or shut up, Canary rival told

CANARY Wharf predator Paul Reichmann has been ordered to put up or shut up after months of obfuscation.

The Takeover Panel has ruled that he must bid by February 13 for the Docklands development he pioneered.

The deadline was set as a Morgan Stanley-led consortium revealed plans to carve up CW if its £1.5bn bid succeeds.

Financiers, advisers and lawyers to Morgan and CW will share £85m fees if the bid goes through.

CW investors are being offered 220p cash and 45p in Aim- quoted B shares for each CW share they own - or 265p cash.

Morgan's consortium, called Silvestor Holdings after the cartoon cat that pursues a canary, plans to sell older parts of CW, leaving 'a core sub-group of buildings'. Parks and roads will be kept. Brian Magnus of Morgan insists: 'It's completely wrong to say it's a smash and grab.'

Under Morgan's offer, CW's old guard of non executives will be swept away, replaced by men in their 30s and early 40s.

CW chief executive George Iacobescu and finance director Peter Anderson get their one-year contracts extended to two years, flouting best practice for public companies.

Iacobescu earned £1.15m in pay and bonus last year, and Anderson took home a £673,000 package. They could reap millions from a bonus pot worth 3% of Silvestor's value, once it has paid off debts.

An egm has been set for February 23 to approve Morgan's bid, needing 75% backing to succeed. It could still be blocked if Reichmann, Brascan - itself a possible bidder - and US investor Franklin team up.

Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal and US property investor Simon Glick, who helped Reichmann resurrect CW after it went bust in the 1990s, are backing Morgan.