Rishi Sunak has given his blessing to a multibillion-pound trend that has seen foreign private equity firms snaffle British businesses, describing the buying spree as “good news” for the economyThe chancellor was speaking at the launch of Treasury Connect, an occasion intended to compile fast-growing tech businesses with investors and politicians to spur innovation in areas like fintech and life sciences.
Addressing a trend during which overseas buyers target UK firms, with supermarket Morrisons set to be the newest to fall, Sunak said: “We’ve always been an economy that benefits from investment in it “I would view it as a symbol of confidence within the UK. It’s excellent news for our economy.”
Private equity investors from abroad spent nearly £25bn on British firms between the beginning of 2021 and mid-August, consistent with figures from Dealogic, compared with £28bn for the entire of 2020 and £30bn in 2019. The figure was quite £42bn factoring in minority stakes, a record since Dealogic began tracking the info in 2005.
Morrisons, the UK’s fourth-largest supermarket chain, is edging closer to a £7bn takeover by the US private equity group Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, while private equity-owned Cobham has agreed to shop for defence company Ultra Electronics for £2.6bn.
Household names that have already been snapped up by private equity since the beginning of the pandemic include the supermarket group Asda, the roadside assistance company AA, the infrastructure firm John Laing and therefore the insurer LV, among many others The chancellor welcomed the trend as he launched a drive to stoke greater investment in cutting-edge technology firms at the event within the Olympic Village in Stratford, east London.
Sunak has focused heavily on technology during his tenure, via policies that the Treasury says are intended to form the united kingdom a “science superpower” These include the launch of a Future Fund that involves the govt taking stakes in additional than 150 businesses, consistent with new data released on Tuesday.
As well as tech champions, they include a kombucha drinks maker, a bespoke shipbuilder plus a knitting and crochet supplier The fund also includes £375m ringfenced for investment in “gamechanging” breakthrough technology Sunak said the govt was creating the conditions for the united kingdom to host tech businesses capable of rivalling Silicon Valley giants.
He said this was happening via the longer term Fund, also as through initiatives like Treasury hook up with help them access finance and political encouragement for pension funds to take a position in riskier, fast-growing businesses But he declined to discuss the £29bn takeover of Cambridge-based Arm by US firm Nvidia, which has raised concerns about the UK’s inability to retain domestic control of world-leading businesses Arm is already owned by Japan’s SoftBank but the proposed Nvidia deal has fuelled fears about whether investment and jobs will stay within the UK.
Asked if he would welcome SoftBank listing Arm within the UK if the Nvidia deal collapses, Sunak said he couldn’t discuss an ongoing process but said that “in general” he wanted to form the united kingdom a beautiful place for companies to travel public Sunak has already moved to ease stock exchange listing rules within the hope that London can compete for lucrative and prestigious floats of tech champions Takeaway app Deliveroo’s listing helped Sunak launch the policy, while life sciences group Oxford Nanopore, whose DNA sequencing technology was snapped up by the united kingdom government and wont to track virus variants, has since announced its own £2.4bn London float.
0
0
