TPG snares funerals group InvoCare in $1.8b win for private equity
Private equity group TPG has won out in its five-month pursuit of InvoCare, after the board of Australia’s biggest funerals and crematoria operator endorsed a trimmed back offer of $1.8 billion.
TPG’s revised $12.70 a share offer price is only marginally above an original $12.65 a share proposal made in March which the InvoCare board rejected at the time because it said that offer did not provide value for shareholders.
InvoCare is the biggest funerals group in Australia, with national brands including Simplicity Funerals and White Lady Funerals. Getty
TPG returned in May with a bid of $13 a share that was deemed high enough to be granted due diligence to scrutinise the inner workings of the company. But this led TPG to cut back its offer price to $12.70 because of softening funeral case volumes and inflation eating into profit margins.
InvoCare runs two national brands, White Lady and Simplicity, and state-based brands including Le Pine in Victoria, George Hartnett Metropolitan in Queensland, Lester and Son in NSW and Blackwell in South Australia. The company has 2000 employees and across its brands conducts about 40,000 funerals a year.
InvoCare shareholders will vote on the buyout proposal at a scheme meeting scheduled for October.
InvoCare chairman Bart Vogel and his board have taken a practical approach, and are unanimously recommending the revised bid.
“The board is unanimous in its view that this transaction is in the best interests of InvoCare shareholders,” he said.
The company, in an announcement on the agreed buyout to the ASX, also gave a trading update which showed in part why it had been unable to defend itself against the private equity group.
It said the near-term economic environment was challenging, and
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