5 On the Market
growth, though he was in discussions with possible advisers. He commented: “Since I have arrived I have had at least 20 firms come to visit me. At the end of the day, we are owned by private equity investors, so if someone turns up and offers a fortune, sure we would sell it to them.”
Charterhouse is considering a sale of long-established Edinburgh-based stockbroker Wood Mackenzie. Wood Mackenzie is one of Scotland’s oldest firms, and could bring in £1
billion and a large profit for its private equity owners. Charterhouse - described as ‘a notoriously secretive and wealthy private equity group’ by The Telegraph - has requested that Quayle Munro, a boutique investment firm, assist with a “low key” review of the business after it received expressions of interest from US trade buyers. Wood Mackenzie was founded in the 1840s, and has had both Sir George Mathewson and Gerry Grimstone act as chairman over the past few years. Charterhouse bought Wood Mackenzie for £553 million from buy-out company Candover in 2004. Charterhouse has been able to pay off about £150 million of the £420 million it borrowed to purchase the firm. Wood Mackenzie’s rapid growth – it reported revenues of £56.4 million before EBITDA in December 2010, up from £5.6 million in 2004 - has been put down to the rise in importance of proprietary data in the oil and gas sector. It is thought the potential sale of the firm would be of particular interest to US businesses including McGraw Hill and IHS.
Two history-steeped pubs in Bristol city centre have been put on the market by their respective owners. Horts, on Broad Street, and the Bristol Cider House, just off Portland Square, have been put up for sale for £775,00 and £275,000 respectively and are both being marketed by estate agent Christie and Co. The Christie representative handling the sales said that they were expecting interest to be high for both of the pubs. Nicholas Calfe, who is managing the Bristol Cider House sale, said that the Georgian premises comes with an established reputation as an award- winning national destination on the cider enthusiasts’ map. “This pub would suit a cider or a real ale enthusiast who could move the business forward by taking advantage of the opportunity to introduce a traditional food menu,” he explained. Horts, which dates back as far as 1850, is a popular and profitable destination for city drinkers due to its prime position in the heart of Bristol’s business district. Marcus Street, who is handling the sale, said, “Horts would lend itself to large corporate operators with the scope to develop the upper floors or experienced publicans wishing to gain a presence in Bristol city centre.” Any potential buyers are encouraged to contact Christie and Co to express their interest.
Granada Learning, one of the UK’s main providers of tests in schools, has been put on the market for a price in the region of
£50 million to £70 million. Its owner, American private equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS), is understood to have brought in corporate adviser Hawkpoint to manage the auction process, the Times has reported. The firm manages student tests for about two-thirds of all UK schools. It also offers assessments, surveys, self-evaluation systems and professional development services, according to its website. Granada Learning Group has two divisions: GL assessment, which runs tests for schools and mental health and well being, such as CAT and YARC; and GL
performance, which focuses on school improvement. Its products include Kirkland Rowell Surveys and Schoolscentre. VSS had previously tried to sell Granada Learning in 2008 in the grip of the credit crunch, but had to pull the sale, as offers did not match its expectations. ITV sold Granada Learning to VSS in 2006 for about £50 million. VSS subsequently sold the Letts and Leckie & Leckie revision guides to publisher Huveaux in a deal worth £12 million. Pearson had been approached as a possible buyer, but was not interested in the sale. It is thought a private equity firm is highly likely to take up the business.
Spirit Pub Co is due to put 80 tenanted public houses on the market amid falling revenues. The 80 loss making pubs are all managed by landlords, but owned by the company, which had recently
reported a 6.4 per cent fall in like-for-like sales during the 12 weeks to 3 March. Spirit also intends to convert another 93 tenanted pubs to managed status. Mike Tye Spirit’s chief executive explained the move to the Financial Times, “We’re stabilising the business for the next six to 12 months – we want to get [the underperforming pubs] out fast and start growing the income of the successful pubs.”The strategy is to “prune once, prune hard” Mr Tye said. The 80 pubs chosen for disposal all rely on beer drinkers and have not been able to increase its food sales or other income streams. The group had taken on about 550 tenanted pubs from last summer’s demerger of Punch Taverns. Spirit’s portfolio of 800 managed pubs recorded a 4.6 per cent increase in overall like-for-like sales from the same period last year, with a 6.2 per cent like-for-like rise in food sales. Its pubs include the Flaming Grill and Chef & Brewer chains. Pubs have seen a rise in food-led sales in the economic downturn from customers still looking eat out, but to spend less in establishments.
A 49 per cent stake in Glasgow- based whisky distillery Whyte & Mackay could be placed on the market, as its Indian owner Vijay Mallya sets about clearing his debts. Mallya’s firm United Spirits Ltd (USL) – which is owned by United Breweries Group - bought
Whyte & Mackay for £595 million in 2007. The sale would help to pay off the group’s £2.5 billion of debts. The sale is one of many options that can be used to reduce the debts. The firm told the Bombay stock exchange in a statement that it has not made yet a decision. The statement followed a media report in India, with a quote from UB Group chief financial officer Ravi Nedungadi saying that “a number of private equity players” had made their interest in the Glaswegian whiskey distillery known. Founded by James Whyte and Charles Mackay’s in 1844 on the docks of Glasgow, Whyte & Mackay makes several single malt whiskeys including Fettercairn, Dalmore and Jura. It has a malt distillery at Tamnavulin and a large grain plant at Invergordon. Whyte & Mackay has won several awards over the past few years, which (on the website) it attributes to the skills of its master blender Richard Paterson.
BUSINESS SALE REPORT - THE UK’S LEADING SOURCE OF INFORMATION ON COMPANIES FOR SALE
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