John Menzies accepts takeover bid from Kuwaiti aviation services rival Agility
Executives at the British aviation services company John Menzies have accepted a £571m takeover deal from a Kuwaiti rival, after rebuffing three previous offers.
A subsidiary of Agility Public Warehousing had made the bid more than a month ago, which was conditional at the time, although the John Menzies board said it would accept the offer.
The Edinburgh-based company, which offers services ranging from cargo and baggage-handling to passenger check-in and plane de-icing and refuelling, told the stock market on Wednesday that it had agreed the terms of the deal.
Agility previously held a 19% stake in Menzies, which it built after first approaching the company. Its final offer price means Menzies’ shareholders will receive 608p a share, which the company said represented an 81% premium to the closing share price on 8 February, the day before it received an initial takeover offer from Agility.
Menzies will be combined with Agility’s National Aviation Services (NAS) unit, an aviation services provider that counts airlines such as British Airways, Air France, KLM, Emirates and Qatar Airways among its customers.
Aviation analysts said the takeover deal would allow Agility, which is listed on the Kuwait stock exchange and the Dubai financial market, to create the world’s largest airport services firm, according to the number of countries it operates in, as international air travel recovers from the impact of the pandemic.
The combined company is expected to have about 35,000 employees and a presence at more than 250 airports in 57 countries, turning around more than 600,000 aircraft a year.
Menzies’ chief executive, Philipp Joeinig, will become the boss of the combined group. The current NAS chief executive will take up the role of
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