Why would that pissant have any say? This should be (and I thought it was) decided by Lauda and the escrows, not that douchebag Ton.
Smells fishy (did he buy some NVST cheap?) and at the very least again that bum shows his sheer and utter incompetence. He needs to get his fat fucking fingers out of the pie and step away allowing this refund to happen smoothly. No one needs his "assistance", input or opinion for this to occur.

I wouldn't trust this guy to even be able to "clean up in aisle 4" let alone manage a project this complex in the future.
Learn your place Ton - its in the dole queue