Boundary Capital, a corporate investment group led by Niall McFadden and Kealan Lennon, has tabled a bid to acquire Buy&Sell, the Irish classified newspaper title being sold by Associated Newspapers of the UK.
Boundary is believed to have offered about €15 million for the business, which is suffering from declining sales. The investment group is believed to regard Buy & Sell's online activities as having significant potential.
This is the latest corporate transaction by Boundary. The Dublin-based group yesterday signed-off on two significant acquisitions.
It is understood Boundary paid €82 million to buy On Demand Communications (ODC), a holding company for Prontaprint and KallKwik; and CJ Fallon, one of Ireland's leading publishers of educational materials.
Both entities were part of the Adare Group, which was formerly headed by Irish businessman Nelson Loane and once listed on the Irish stock exchange. The company is now based in Britain.
Mr Lennon, who formerly headed Kartoncraft, a pharmaceutical packaging business, led the buyout and will join the board of both companies as chairman.
It is understood that Boundary plans to expand ODC by acquisition and will also look at the possibility of floating it on the secondary stock markets in Dublin and London.
ODC holds the global rights to Prontaprint and the European rights to KallKwik, although they currently operate in Britain and Ireland only through a network of 320 franchised retail design, direct mail and digital print centres.
Between them, Prontaprint and KallKwik employ 1,500 people and have annual sales of more than €175 million.
Livingstone Guarantee, the London-based corporate finance house, advised Adare Group on the transaction.
In relation to Buy & Sell, it is not clear how many bids have been lodged for the title, the sale of which is being handled by Merrion Corporate Finance.
The title was reported to be on the market for more than €20 million.
C-Ads, a multimedia group that specialises in operating display screens that broadcast advertising on petrol forecourts, has also submitted a bid of more than €10 million.
Thomas Crosbie Holdings, the Cork-based publisher of the Irish Examiner and the Evening Echo newspapers, was rumoured to be in the running but is not thought to have submitted an offer.
Latest figures for Buy & Sell from the Audit Bureau of Circulations show the magazine's circulation declined to 80,844 between July and December 2006. The paper also operates a website, buyandsell.ie, but this is thought to be under pressure from eBay.
