Bidders for Stationery Office cut down to five
The Stationery Office, the private company that does much of the government’s publishing including the Highway Code and Hansard, is this month expected to receive second-round offers in an auction involvingboth trade and private equity bidders.
TSO’s owner, Apax, the private equity firm, gave UBS the mandate to sell the company in April.
The investment bank has already eliminated a number of bidders that competed in the first round.
It has whittled down the list to five bidders, two trade and three private equity, according to people familiar with the situation.
One person said the bidding could go to a third round as TSO is cautious about giving too much information to trade buyers that, were they to lose the bidding battle, could use information gained through due diligence against TSO.
The company has an estimated price-tag of Pounds 120m.
Originally His Majesty’s Stationery Office, it was founded in 1786, during the reign of King George III.
It prints about 15,000 titles a year for the government and other clients.
It is the largest publisher in the UK by volume. It was privatised in 1996 when a group of venture capitalists bought it for Pounds 54m.
The privatisation was controversial because some said the venture capital group paid too low a price.
In 1999, Apax bought the company for Pounds 82m.
Industry sources said possible trade buyers would be R R Donnelly & Sons, which last year bought Astron Group, an UK outsourcing company that has some business overlap with TSO, for about Pounds 520m; and Deutsche Post, which owns Williams Lea, a document services company that would also be compatible with TSO.
Apax and UBS declined to comment about the identity of the private equity bidders.
The most recent accounts available though Companies House show that TSO made Pounds 53m in gross profit in 2004, up from Pounds 50.2m in 2003.
Operating profit rose to Pounds 9m in 2004 from Pounds 2.7m the year before. It reported net losses of Pounds 2.2m in 2004 after reporting losses of Pounds 9.8m in 2003.
Tim Hailstone, TSO chairman, was previously chief executive and has held senior positions at Pearson and Harcourt General.
Richard Dell, chief executive, joined TSO in 1997 after 10 years at Ernst & Young.
