TDC agrees to €10.2bn leveraged buy-out

TDC, the Danish telecommunications group, agreed to be bought on Wednesday by Nordic Telephone Company, a private equity consortium, in a leveraged buy-out deal worth DKr76bn (€10.2bn), Europe’s largest.

Including debt, the deal is valued at $15.3bn (€13bn), which would make it the second biggest leveraged buy-out, trailing only the $31.3bn buy-out of RJR Nabisco in 1989. However, the pending $15bn bid for Hertz in the US could still outrank it.

Thorleif Krarup, TDC board chairman, said: “There’s an almost 100 per cent probability that this bid will succeed.” Kurt Björklund, of Permira Advisers, one of the five funds behind the bid, said there was “a very high degree of certainty” of success.

The other consortium members are Apax Partners, the Blackstone Group, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Providence Equity Partners.

Mr Björklund, who will replace Mr Krarup as chairman, said NTC had bought 10.08 per cent of TDC’s equity within a few hours of announcing its bid, which was accepted by the Danish carrier’s board on Wednesday.

TDC’s board said it would recommend the bid but it retained its freedom to consider an alternative offer, should one be made.