FDBusiness.com

Netherlands-based food group VION has agreed to a management buy-out of its UK pork operations, securing around 4,000 jobs, subject to Competition Authority approval in Ireland. The deal, led by Seamus Carr, managing director of VION’s Pork Business Unit, is backed by UK private equity firm Endless, which has a strong track record of investing in companies in the UK across a wide range of sectors.

The disposal follows VION’s strategic decision to sell its UK food operations, employing in total 13,000 people at 38 sites, to focus on its core food activities in the Netherlands and Germany and its global ingredients business. Discussions are ongoing with a number of prospective purchasers for VION’s other UK business units for poultry and red meat.

VION’s UK pork facilities are located in Wiveliscombe, Malton, Haverhill, Scunthorpe, Hull, Stoke and Enfield in England, at Cookstown inNorthern Ireland and the pig farming and feed mill operation in Scotland at Brydock, Aberdeenshire. In addition, VION operates the McGees butchers business in the Republic of Ireland.

Seamus Carr, who will be managing director of the new company, comments: “VION’s decision to sell its UK business naturally caused a degree of uncertainty amongst staff, suppliers and customers. Therefore, I’m very pleased that we have quickly been able to agree a deal for the pork business which secures the future for our staff, our suppliers and gives our customers a seamless transition. Our ambitions for the new business are firstly to maintain the excellent levels of service and product quality which have helped us secure orders from all the major supermarkets and then to build upon the opportunities in the marketplace to grow the business.”

Seamus Carr, managing director of Vion’s pork business, pictured with Northern Ireland Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster.

Peter Barr, chairman of VION UK, warmly welcomes the management buy-out. He says: “When we announced our intention to sell, we highlighted the viability of the UK businesses and the strong interest from prospective purchasers. The swiftness with which we’ve been able to agree a deal with the management team of the pork business unit, which knows the company inside-out, underlines our confidence in the sales process. It’s therefore very encouraging that the pork business unit should be the subject of a successful and swift sale and this augurs well for our ongoing discussions with prospective buyers of the remaining areas of the business.”

VION will now focus on securing the sale of its remaining poultry and red meat operations in the UK, which employ around 8,000 people. Both businesses remain profitable and cash-generative and are generating significant interest from prospective purchasers.

Endless is a specialist investor in UK headquartered businesses, and is widely known for acquiring non-core businesses from large groups. This is the latest in a string of investments in UK businesses that were previously owned by large, often overseas, parent groups including Crown Paints from Akzo Nobel, Bathstore from Wolseley, Acenta Steel from Niagara LaSalle, Davy Markham from TH Global and Amco Group from Billington Holdings.

VION entered the UK in the late 1990s with the acquisition of Key Country Foods, followed by Tranfield and subsequently Grampian Country Food Group in 2008, supplying beef, lamb, pork and chicken products to a broad range of blue-chip customers across the food retailing, food manufacturing and food service sectors.