Benihana Announces Results of Shareholder Vote Regarding Simplifying Capital Structure

Benihana Inc. BNHN announced the preliminary results of today's Special Meeting for stockholders to consider the proposal to simplify the Company's capital structure by reclassifying each share of Class A Common Stock into one share of Common Stock. The Company said that it received the overwhelming support of stockholders voting at the meeting who were not affiliated with the Company's largest stockholder, Benihana of Tokyo. Excluding BOT votes, Georgeson, the Company's proxy solicitor, believes that approximately 82% of votes cast by holders of Common Stock voted in favor of the reclassification proposal. Although the majority of votes cast at the meeting were strongly in favor of the proposal, as a result of BOT's large voting block, the Company expects that by a small margin of approximately 275,000 shares of Common Stock the proposal did not receive the required approval by a majority of the outstanding shares of Common Stock. All other classes of stock voted a majority of shares outstanding in favor of the proposal.