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Reliance Industries has teamed up with private equity firm Apollo to make a £5.5bn binding offer for Boots, according to Bloomberg.
The deal will reportedly allow its US parent company, Walgreens Boots Alliance, to keep a minority stake. However, the size of the stake is still open to negotiation.
Reliance is India’s largest listed company by market capitalisation, and is controlled by billionaire Mukesh Ambani. Bloomberg said the takeover is expected to lead to an expansion of Boots to Asia.
Bloomberg added that Reliance and Apollo’s main competitor in the bidding is a consortium of Britain’s billionaire Issa brothers and TDR Capital, who submitted a non-binding offer in recent weeks.
Deliberations are ongoing and a winning bidder could reportedly be picked as soon as the coming weeks, although there is no certainty this will lead to a transaction.
All in all, Walgreens has been seeking a valuation of about £7bn for Boots. The business runs a network of more than 2,200 stores across the UK, as well as private-label brands such as No7 Beauty Co. and operations in other countries.
