PARIS (Standard&Poor's) Nov. 17, 2005--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services said today that its ratings on France-based engineered materials manufacturer and distributor Compagnie de Saint-Gobain S.A. (BBB+/Stable/A-2) remain unchanged following Saint-Gobain's announcement of a now recommended cash offer on BPB PLC (BBB+/Watch Neg/A-2), valuing the latter's equity at £3.9 billion ($6.7 billion), up from £3.7 billion. We do not expect that the higher price offered by Saint-Gobain will hinder the company from steadily improving its financial profile thereafter and achieving a ratio of FFO to net debt of at least 25% in the future, although the ratio could be temporarily somewhat lower. That said, should the acquisition be successful, we still expect to revise the outlook on Saint-Gobain to
