Kuwait’s Agility locks in John Menzies takeover after upping offer to 608 pence

The board of John Menzies plc has accepted an offer from Kuwaiti firm Agility, which is set to see a subsidiary of the Kuwaiti logistics company take over the Scottish aviation firm.

Menzies has said it will recommend its shareholders accept an offer from Kuwaiti firm Agility Logistics, through which Agility subsidiary National Aviation Service (NAS) would acquire Menzies at a price of 608 pence a share.

“NAS has confirmed to the board that the financial terms of the final proposal are final and will not be increased, except that NAS reserves the right to increase the amount of the offer price if there is an announcement on or after the date of this announcement of a firm offer for Menzies by a third party offeror,” the Edinburgh-based company said in a statement.

Commenting on the news, Buckinghamshire New University professor of aviation Francesco Ragni, said Menzies had become an easy target because, after a few years of significant growth, it was badly hit by the pandemic.

“For NAS it’s a move that makes strategic sense,” he told Morning Wire “With the acquisition of Menzies NAS will be able to accelerate their growth, reaching a larger scale and a global presence.”

The deal comes as NAS’s fourth all cash offer to take over the Edinburgh headquartered firm, after the Kuwaiti logistics company offered to buy the firm for 450 pence a share in January.

NAS later upped its all-cash offer to 510 pence a share on 9 February, and to 605 pence last week, before Menzies agreed to NAS’s all-cash offer of 608 pence a share.

On Thursday, Menzies’s shares rocketed after the Kuwait-based company acquired a 13.2 per cent stake, becoming de factor the company’s majority stakeholder. A day later, NAS announced it had acquired an additional 5.8 per cent stake to a total of 19 per cent.

Shares in Menzies are currently trading at 582p on the London Stock Exchange.