Morrisons owner plots sale of supermarket’s property assets
Morrisons owner Clayton Dubilier & Rice is understood to be planning to sell several of the supermarket’s warehouses, fisheries and food manufacturing plants.
According to The Sunday Times, the private equity firm is marketing the range of property assets to potential buyers as it looks to raise £600 million from the sales.
The newspaper said it expects the portfolio to contain more than two dozen sites out of Morrisons’ nine distribution centres and 20 manufacturing plants. These would then be likely to be leased back to Morrisons by their new owners.
Earlier this month, the Competition and Markets Authority confirmed that CD&R could complete its £7 billion takeover of Morrisons.
There had been concerns that the acquisition would result in a substantial lessening of competition markets in the UK, as like Morrisons, CD&R runs a number petrol forecourts around the country through its Motor Fuel Group.
However, the CMA has now formally accepted an offer from CD&R to sell 87 of its forecourts to enable the takeover to push through.
