Report: Amtico for Sale at Auction for £100m ($178
London, England, April 21, 2006--Luxury flooring manufacturer Amtico is up for sale with a £100m (US$178.2m) price-tag, according to a report in the Daily Telegraph.
The report said that the company, which makes and sells specialized vinyl flooring, is to be sold in an auction process conducted by Close Brothers Corporate Finance (CBCF).
CBCF has been appointed to lead the sale by Amtico's shareholders, a mixture of Amtico directors and private equity firm Electra.
The sale comes 11 years after Electra backed a £52.8m (US$93m) management buyout of the business.
Electra itself invested £17.1m (US$30.5M) as part of the original deal, a figure that is likely to double if the business is sold for the expected £100m.
First-round bids for Amtico are due by May 8 and there is expected to be strong interest from private equity houses interested in a secondary buyout and trade players alike.
Private equity houses including 3i and Hg Capital are thought to be taking a look at the memorandum compiled by CBCF.
Meanwhile potential trade buyers include Carpetright, which has its own laminates business, and perhaps even retailers Topps Tiles or Floors 2 Go. Amtico had a turnover of £80m (US$142.5M) in the year to March 2005 and made an operating profit of £8.7m ($15.5m).
The company can trace its roots back to the Courtaulds empire in the mid-1960s and Courtaulds still owns a sizeable chunk of Amtico's shares.
Amtico was set up in Coventry in 1964 as a joint venture between Courtaulds and American Biltrite, but the UK business was wholly taken over by Courtaulds in 1969. It has rights to the Amtico brand everywhere except Canada and has since opened operations in France and Sweden.
