EMI agrees to £2.4bn takeover by private equity group

Troubled music corporate
EMI
has accepted a bid from private equity group Terra Firma in a bid to draw a
line under its recent troubles.

The music group released its full-year figures yesterday, which revealed a
bottom line loss of £264m, compared with a £118m profit last year. These came on
the back of two profit warnings declared earlier this year as its net debts
looked set to rocket to £1.25bn.

Terra Firma snapped up EMI for a mere 265p a share – an embarrassing 17% less
than it turned down from Warner Music last
summer and 15% lower than it was offered by private equity rival Permira last
December.

Both companies were rejected, in the latter case because – according to chief
exec Eric Nicoli – it did not ‘fully reflect the value of the company’.

Speculation has been generated in the City that
Terra Firma will look
to streamline the management, putting the position of CFO Martin Stewart into
question.

Further reading:

EMI mulls £1bn rescue package