Fund administration business Sanne has agreed to be taken over by Apex Group in a $2.07B (£1.5B) deal.
Sanne chairman Rupert Robson said, “Sanne has a bright future ahead of it as a leader in its industry, which is entirely due to the tremendous effort of the management team and employees of the business over the past several years for which the board of Sanne would like to express their gratitude. Sanne has delivered substantial value creation to its shareholders since IPO and today’s acquisition ensures that our investors are compensated for the future potential of the business, at what we believe is a compelling 28.8x EV/EBITDA and 40.7x P/E for 2020.”
Broker Liberum said, “We had anticipated that the takeover would go through given the sluggish share price and profit growth over the last few years and we think 920p/share is good value for shareholders. It also provides more evidence of private equity appetite for professional services companies and the willingness to pay attractive premia to the listed valuations.”