LONDON (Standard&Poor's) Sept. 25, 2009--Standard&Poor's Ratings Services said today that its ratings and outlook on the Unilever group (A+/Stable/A-1) are unaffected by today's announcement that the group has made a binding offer to acquire the personal care business of Sara Lee Corp. (BBB+/Negative/A-2), for €1.3 billion. U.K.-based Unilever PLC and Netherlands-based Unilever N.V. are the joint parent companies of the Unilever group. We anticipate that, following the transaction, Unilever's ratio of funds from operations to debt should, within 12 months after the completion of the transaction, recover to about 35%, which we consider compatible with the current rating level. This is based on the group's ability to generate about €1 billion of discretionary cash flows from
