A Dubai sovereign wealth fund has teamed up with Blackstone and others aiming to buy Informa from under the noses of a rival private-equity consortium, the Financial Times has learned.

Providence Equity Partners, Carlyle and Hellman & Friedman are well advanced in attempts to buy the business publisher and events company in a deal which, at £3.2bn, would be the largest private equity buyout anywhere in the world since the credit crunch began.