Flybe plans £300m stock market listing
29.11.09
Regional airline Flybe is preparing for a stock market flotation that will bring a windfall for its staff and shareholders, the Times reports. The Exeter-based company, which has twice shelved float plans in the past, is expected to be valued at around £300m. The newspaper reports that Merrill Lynch, the airline’s long-standing adviser, has been instructed to prepare for a listing next year.
The directors, led by chairman and chief executive Jim French, have decided that the rebound in stock markets this year has cleared the way for the group to go public. It would mean a bumper payday for investors, including the family trust of Jack Walker, the late Blackburn Rovers Football Club owner, which controls 69% of the business.
Mr French will also be rewarded handsomely as he has a 7% stake. Staff have 9% and British Airways owns the remaining 15%, which it acquired when BA Connect, its regional airline, was 'sold' to Flybe in 2006.
Management are reported to want to wait until March when full-year figures for 2009 are published. It believes that substantial value has been added since the takeover of BA Connect. The airline has been planning to float since 2005 but two previous attempts were shelved. The most recent, in 2008, was halted because of the global financial crisis.
Flybe operates 180 routes between 55 European airports. It was founded in 1979 as Jersey European Airways before being taken over by Jack Walker’s steel empire in 1983. After several name changes, it settled on Flybe in 2002.
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