Eircom’s IPO advisers Morgan Stanley, Rothschild and Goldman Sachs, are said to have approached private equity firms to assess chances of a sale to a consortium of investors instead of a listing.
Firms contacted by the sell side advisers are thought…
Eircom’s IPO advisers Morgan Stanley, Rothschild and Goldman Sachs, are said to have approached private equity firms to assess chances of a sale to a consortium of investors instead of a listing.
Firms contacted by the sell side advisers are thought to include KKR, Apax, and CVC.
The development, reported by Bloomberg with reference to three unnamed people with knowledge of the matter, comes three months after it first emerged that Eircom hired banks to advise on a possible return to the stock markets.
Blackstone was also approached, the report said, but it decided against bidding. The buyout firm took a stake in Eircom via subsidiary GSO Capital in 2012, when the telco was taken over by its bondholders after it fell into an administration process called examinership.
The talks with the PE firms are at an early stage.
Local reports suggest previously that Eircom’s owners could be tempted to offload the asset in a quick-fire trade sale before IPO plans advance significantly.
