PHP sweetens Assura bid amid ongoing contest with KKR
Primary Health Properties (PHP) has offered a number of concessions to Assura as it fights to beat private equity giant KKR in its bid for the real estate investment trust.
PHP, which has already made a number of bids for Assura – the latest at 51.7p per share, or £1.68bn – pledged to lower Assura’s acceptance condition of the offer and to accelerate its quarterly dividend in October.
The firm said these concessions were made to “increase the certainty of execution”.
PHP has been locked in a bidding war with rival KKR for months, with KKR’s February bid of £1.56bn now upped to £1.7bn and PHP’s bid upped from £1.5bn to £1.68bn.
The KKR-led consortium, which also includes Stonepeak, made its “best and final offer” of £1.7bn on June 11.
The consortium has slammed PHP’s offer as coming with “numerous critical issues” that could “significantly increase the financial risk profile of the combined entity”.
In its statement today, PHP “strongly advised” Assura shareholders to take no action in response to KKR’s offer, arguing that a PHP-Assura tie-up represents a “highly compelling proposition”.
“This is underpinned by the Board’s belief that the sector is at an inflexion point in the current economic cycle with strong rental growth and lower interest rates enhancing primary care property values and with net asset values per share expected to continue to improve,” the company said.
The takeover follows an initial plan for Assura to be acquired through a Court-sanctioned scheme of arrangement, a process used for large mergers and acquisitions that requires shareholder and court approval.
However, to increase the certainty of completion and provide shareholders with a direct cash exit, the bidders have opted for a takeover offer.
The firm will be added to a 2025’s growing list of departures and follow a tech takeover frenzy on Monday that included three separate billion-pound mergers and acquisitions moves as US giants seized on British bargains.