Stagecoach Group founders Sir Brian Souter and his sister, Dame Ann Gloag, will be nearly £150 million richer after the transport group accepted a £595m offer for the business.
Global investor DWS Infrastructure, boasting assets under management worth more than £770 billion, has outgunned rival suitor National Express with an offer of £1.05 per share.
It sent shares in Stagecoach rocketing more than 37% today.
The National Express bid, which was backed by the board of Stagecoach last December, valued the Perth-headquartered business at around £437m.
Sir Brian, 67, currently owns 14.54% of Stagecoach, putting him in line for a windfall of about £86.5m.
Dame Ann has a 10.46% stake in the business, worth more than £62.2m under the terms of the DWS deal.
A takeover by National Express would likely have seen Perth head office jobs move to Birmingham.
Stagecoach said the DWS bid offered greater certainty for investors and employees.
Overall headcount in frontline operational roles is expected to remain the same, the firm added.
The new deal is also expected to provide continuity at the top, with senior bosses staying in post.
A ‘new and exciting’ chapter for Stagecoach
Stagecoach chief executive Martin Griffiths said: “The proposed offer presents a major opportunity to maximise the significant growth potential ahead.
“We believe it will open a new and exciting chapter for Stagecoach, backed by a team who share our vision for a more sustainable future.”
The DWS offer marks a 37% premium to Stagecoach’s closing share price of 76.55p on Tuesday.
It also significantly tops the National Express offer, which was worth just over 69.34p a share.
The offer from National Express would have given Stagecoach’s shareholders a 25% stake in the enlarged £1.9bn business.
A statement from National Express said: “A further announcement will be made in due course.”
DWS already has a number of long-term infrastructure investments in the UK.
These include Yorkshire Water owner Kelda and Peel Ports, as well as stakes in other European transport groups, including Belgian public bus operator Hansea.
Hamish Mackenzie, head of infrastructure, DWS, said the investor would back Stagecoach to “rapidly capitalise on the growth opportunities” of increased public and private investment.
New bid protects jobs
The new bid could also save Perth jobs that were at risk under the offer from National Express.
It was expected operations would be run from Birmingham.
That would have ended more than 40 years of Stagecoach, founded in 1980, in Perth.
The National Express and Stagecoach tie-up was under investigated by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).
The CMA served a so-called initial enforcement order in January stopping the firms from combining operations or selling any UK businesses while it looked into the deal.
Last April Stagecoach said Sir Brian and Dame Ann had sold shares worth around £11m.
The siblings, or rather their “connected parties”, disposed of more than 11.5 million units of stock, representing a 2.1% stake in the business.
They planned to reduce their shareholding to about 5% within 10 years.
