Potential sale of Pizza Express owner

Buyout firm Cinven is mulling a possible sale of Pizza Express owner Gondola Group, after hanging on to it for eight years.

Private equity firms usually hold on to portfolio companies for three to five years before selling on, but in the lengthy economic downturn Cinven held tight for longer.

With the economy picking up, Cinven is now considering hiring bankers after the summer to look at strategic options for Gondola Group, including a full or partial sale. It is believed preliminary talks with bankers regarding a sale have taken place over the past few weeks. An unnamed source said a sale is likely to happen next year.

Cinven purchased Gondola Group in 2006 in a €1.3 billion (£1.1bn) deal, and took on some of Britain’s most popular restaurant chains including Byron, Zizzi and Ask.

The buyout firm had previously received unsolicited bids for burger chain Byron, and ran a sale process, only to pull out after the bidders did not meet its price requirements.

Operating 680 restaurants, and staffed by a workforce of 15,000, a possible sale of Gondola may be worth about £1 billion.

In the group’s interim report, chairman Chris Woodhouse said: “We have delivered a resilient performance, despite the challenging backdrop, as the UK economy remained under pressure.”

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Related information:
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