Billionaire Benettons to sell Autogrill to Swiss firm

Bloomberg

The billionaire Benetton family agreed to sell their controlling stake in highway restaurant operator Autogrill SpA to duty-free company Dufry AG, creating a
$6 billion player in the travel retail market and accelerating the overhaul of the Italian industrial clan’s holdings.
As part of the deal, the Benettons will sell their majority
stake in Autogrill to become the biggest single investor in Dufry with a stake of as much as 25%. Dufry will then bid for rest of the Italian company.
The combination with Dufry is the second major deal in recent months for the Benettons after they agreed with Blackstone Inc in April to take highway operator Atlantia SpA private, valuing the business at 19 billion euros ($19.2 billion). The pace of transformation has quickened under Alessandro Benetton, the son
of company founder Luciano Benetton, who took the reins at the 11 billion-euro holding Edizione Holding SpA this year.
The shakeup at Edizione began in the wake of the deadly 2018 bridge collapse in Genoa, northern Italy, on a section of road managed by the family’s Autostrade per l’Italia.
The Benettons eventually sold Autostrade to end a standoff with the government over the disaster. Autogrill investors will receive either a new Dufry share or 6.33 euros in cash for each share in the Italian company.
The cash offer would value Autogrill at about 2.44 billion euros. Autogrill fell as much as 9.4% in Milan, as the offer price for minority investors stands below Autogrill’s closing price.
“This is not a transaction done at current market prices,” Dufry Chief Executive Officer Xavier Rossinyol, who will lead the combined group, said at a press conference in Zurich.
“The exchange ratio has been calculated in a way to reflect the value of the two companies, taking into consideration a longer point of time.”

US Expansion
The combined group will have 5,500 outlets at around 1,200 airports and other locations, according to a statement. The deal will allow Dufry to build its presence in the US, while adding to other locations in Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. Basel-based Dufry and the Benettons — who built a business empire with the namesake clothing brand in the 1960s — have been talking about a potential tie-up for months, following a series of informal approaches over the past few years. Bloomberg News first reported about the deal in April.
The travel retail group emerging from a deal between Dufry and the Benettons had a combined market value of over
$6 billion when preliminary talks were first reported in April.