(Reuters) -British healthcare real estate investor Assura on Monday recommended rival Primary Health Properties’ new 1.79 billion pounds ($2.4 billion) takeover bid that trumps a lower offer from KKR and Stonepeak Partners.
Primary Health Properties’s (PHP) latest 53.3 pence per share bid was higher than KKR-Stonepeak’s “best and final” offer of 52.1 pence tabled earlier this month, and at a 47% premium to Assura’s closing price before KKR-Stonepeak’s first approach.
Assura shareholders would get 0.3865 new PHP shares, 12.5 pence in cash, and be entitled to a special dividend of 0.84 pence per share under the terms of the latest bid, the companies said.
The private equity firms and PHP have been competing over Assura for months, gradually sweetening their offers for the company which manages over 600 healthcare properties and counts Britain’s state-backed National Health Service as a customer.
($1 = 0.7444 pounds)
(Reporting by Shashwat Awasthi in Bengaluru; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala)
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