LONDON (Alliance News) - The back-and-forth takeover battle for UK-listed equipment rental company Lavendon Group PLC continued on the first day of trading in 2017 as Belgium's TVH Group NV added another penny a share to its offer to trump France's Loxam SAS.
Lavendon is the Europe and Middle East leader in powered access equipment, which includes equipment like scissor lifts and truck mounts. Its lifts are used to erect the famous Christmas lights display on London's Regent Street.
TVH - a Belgian industrial equipment firm which supplies forklift trucks, aerial work platforms and agricultural tractors - was the first to enter the bidding battle back in November. At that time, Lavendon revealed it had received a 205.00 pence takeover offer from TVH back in September, but said TVH had not secured enough support from its shareholders for its board to recommend the offer.
Just a week later, French industrial equipment rental company Loxam - which also specialises in aerial platforms and earthmoving machinery - entered the fray and soon made a 220.00p offer for Lavendon which managed to secure the blessing of the group's board. Lavendon's board is still recommending Loxam's offer and has yet to comment on the new TVH bid.
Since those initial bids, the pair have engaged in a tit-for-tat battle to buy Lavendon, the latest twist in which was TVH offering 261.00p per share on Tuesday, valuing Lavendon at GBP444.0 million.
The new TVH bid is an 88% premium to Lavendon's closing price on November 21, before the first bid for the firm was revealed.
Lavendon shares were up 1.1% on Tuesday at 267.00p, suggesting investors expect the bidding war to continue.
TVH has said it believes the combination of its equipment business with Lavendon would be "highly complementary" in terms of capabilities, regional presence, customers and suppliers.
Loxam, meanwhile, said buying Lavendon would consolidate its position as the leading player in the aerial work platforms market in Europe and the third-largest worldwide, in addition to bolstering its presence in the broader European equipment rental space.
The bidding war began only a week after Lavendon had said its results for 2016 were set to marginally outpace its previous expectations. Lavendon said group rental revenue rose 9.0% in the first nine months to the end of September year-on-year, with 8.0% growth in the UK, 2.0% growth in Europe and 20% growth in its Middle East business.
The Middle East business is particularly attractive to the two bidders, with Lavendon holding a series of contracts to provide equipment for big events, including the 2022 World Cup due to be held in Qatar.
By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance
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