Uniq looking tasty as bidders move in

By Rupert Steiner for the Daily Mail
Updated: 04:43 EDT, 2 April 2011

Sandwich-maker Uniq said it has been approached by a number of bidders and has appointed bankers to kick start a sale process.

Interest: From rival firms and private equity players

The firm, which recently clinched a life-saving deal to fix its £400m pension black hole, also moved on to the smaller Alternative Investment Market yesterday triggering the sale process.

It recently sold 90% of itself to the guardians of its retirement scheme.

The transfer of all its shares to the junior market was the first opportunity pension trustees had to crystallise their holding.

The pension trustees of the firm, which is a key supplier to Marks & Spencer and also makes chilled food and puddings, hope to cash in on consolidation sweeping the industry.

In the past few weeks Goodfellas Pizza maker Northern Foods was gobbled up by chicken magnate Ranjit Boparan.

Uniq said in a statement yesterday that bankers Spayne Lindsay & Co had been appointed as its corporate finance advisers and that the pension trustees 'intend to undertake a process to realise all or part of its shareholding in the company'.

The statement went on to say: 'The board has received a number of indications of interest from third parties regarding a potential offer for, or investment in, the company.'

The interest is understood to have come both from rival firms and private equity players.

One suitor is thought to be Irish sandwich maker Greencore, which was beaten to a tie up with Northern Foods by Boparan.

Uniq's pension problems are a hangover from its former life as state-owned dairy group Unigate, when it employed an army of milkmen.

In 2000, Unigate morphed into Uniq (up 2.55p to 67.9p) and sold most of its food and dairy businesses but it was still responsible for Unigate's 21,000-member retirement plan.

The sale of the business would mark an end to an uncomfortable few years in which it had been weighed down by its pension liabilities.

The Pensions Regulator last year rejected Uniq's plan to wipe out its pension shortfall by proposing a three year hiatus on payments into the scheme and use the cash to embark on an acquisition drive.

The company had argued it had a better chance of supporting members if it achieved scale.

Now it seems its only chance to gain scale will be if it is acquired by a bigger group.