Cinven pulls out of takeover battle for Sanne

Private equity firm Cinven has bowed out of the potential bidding war to buy FTSE 250 asset manager Sanne Group.

London-based Cinven made a series of takeover offers for Sanne earlier this year, sweetening its final offer to 875p per share, valuing the firm at around £1.4 billion in June.

This offer was ultimately rejected by the board at Sanne.

However, this was then topped by global financial services firm Apex Group in August.

Apex’s board of directors agreed a 920p-per-share offer for Sanne, valuing the business at £1.51 billion.

UK takeover regulators had given Cinven a deadline to table a further offer or walk away from the move, with the company confirming on Friday that it will not table another bid.

The proposed takeover by Apex is the latest in a flurry of acquisitions in the UK in 2021, with a raft of mergers and acquisitions taking place across financial services, defence, healthcare and retail.

Jersey-based Sanne provides outsourcing services to nearly 2,000 clients, ranging from private debt to capital markets, and recorded a 12% increase in earnings last year.

Upon agreeing its takeover offer, Apex chief executive Peter Hughes said: “Sanne offers an exciting opportunity to acquire a well-established alternative fund services provider with diverse and complementary jurisdictional and asset class expertise.”

Shareholders at Sanne will vote on the deal at a general meeting and the move is set to complete in the first half of 2022.

Shares in Sanne Group dipped by 1.9% to 913p in early trading.