CANADA'S Alcan Aluminium has completed the sale to a management buy-out of its 12 downstream aluminium businesses run by its British Alcan subsidiary for around #200m.
A new company, British Aluminium, has been formed headed by chief executive Ian McKinnon, who was recruited to British Alcan's senior management team in 1991 and left during 1994 to pursue this management buy-out opportunity.
The new owners of the businesses are institutional investors led by Mercury Development Capital, with Morgan Grenfell Development Capital and CVC Capital Partners and there will also be a management stake.
There are six British Alcan Aluminium operations in Scotland of which only two - the Alcan Metal Centres branches in Glasgow and Aberdeen - are included in the sale. Alcan will retain Alcan Smelting & Power UK, based in Newcastle, which includes primary aluminium smelters at Lochabar and Kinlochleven, and Alcan Rolled Products UK which includes mills at Falkirk and Glasgow.
Senior debt facilities for the deal were led and arranged by Bank of Scotland, and underwritten by it along with Morgan Grenfell and the Royal Bank of Scotland. In total #265m of finance has been raised for the transaction, allowing scope for new investment and growth.
British Aluminiun, which will be based in new headquarters in Manchester, will be an independent, private company with turnover in excess of #500m and profits of more than #25m.
It said it aims to be ``a significant force in the aluminium industry in the UK, and will play an important role in the international market place with major operations in the US as well as the UK''.
Alcan, meanwhile, remains the UK's largest producer of primary aluminium, rolled aluminium products and alumina chemicals, in line with the company's strategy to concentrate on its core businesses.
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