Acceptances by Hellaby's shareholders of the $3.60-per-share offer have gained further ground, rising from 87.1% on Friday to 88.5% yesterday morning.
Once Bapcor attains a 90% stake, it can enforce mop-up provisions under the Takeovers Code, meaning hold-out shareholders will have to sell.
Hellaby could well be delisted from the NZX close to the same date it listed, in late March, 1994.
Taking a 100% stake will cost Bapcor $351.8 million.
Craigs Investment Partners broker Peter McIntyre said ``high on the agenda'' of Bapcor would be divestment of unwanted divisions.
``[However] its first port of call is to get to 90%, which looks like it could be this week,'' he said.
``They will likely give a market update shortly after,'' Mr McIntyre said.
Delisting from the NZX would follow within weeks.
He said Hellaby's shoe chain and resource divisions were considered ``non-core'' assets to Bapcor and it would want to divest itself of those assets, but ``they won't be giving them away''.
Bapcor's beachhead in New Zealand, through Hellaby's 120 auto-parts and services outlets, builds on its 750 outlets in Australia, many from an earlier company takeover.
Hellaby's 120 New Zealand automotive outlets are made up of 10 business brands, including Brake & Transmission, Diesel Distributors, HCB Technologies and Autolign, the latter including 22 Shock Shop franchises around the country.
Several of the 10 brands predominant in New Zealand also have a further more than 30 branches around Australia.
Combined, the New Zealand and Australia automotive branches employ more than 800 staff.
Hellaby is New Zealand's largest footwear retail group, with three retail chains operating 117 stores across New Zealand; including Number One Shoes (51 stores), Hannahs (52) and Hush Puppies brands (10) as well as online outlets.
In Hellaby's resources services group is TBS Group, a specialist industrial asset maintenance provider with New Zealand clients in the oil and gas, agricultural, construction and power generator markets, for the past 45 years.
Its Contract Resources division is a specialist international technical services company for owners of complex processing facilities, including the oil, gas, petrochemical, mineral and power generation sectors.
