This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Steris Corp. is spending about $1.9 billion to buy British sterilization services company Synergy Health as U.S. corporations continue to incorporate overseas despite attempts to make such tax-saving maneuvers less lucrative.
The medical products maker says the combined company will keep its operational headquarters in Mentor, Ohio, but it will incorporate in the United Kingdom, where it will have a tax rate of about 25 percent.
Numerous U.S. companies have made such overseas acquisitions, which are known as inversions. Inversions can help businesses lower the taxes they pay in the U.S., which has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the industrialized world.
These moves have drawn some public backlash and the Obama administration recently enacted changes to make inversions less attractive.