Tate & Lyle circled by US private equity behemoth Advent

The spotlight this week will be on US private equity firm Advent as it prepares a bid for Tate & Lyle.

The buyout giant is drumming up an offer for the FTSE 250-listed artificial sweetener firm, founded by Henry Tate in Liverpool in 1859. 

Shares in the firm shot up on the reports, which appeared first in the Financial Times, pushing its market value to £3 billion.

Advent snapped up British aerospace manufacturing firm Cobham in 2019 for £4 billion. But when it sold off large parts of the business 18 months after the deal was completed it sparked outrage.

The disposal left Cobham, whose pioneering refuelling technology allowed Royal Air Force planes to carry out missions in the Falklands war of 1982, without any UK manufacturing sites. 

The speed of the dismemberment fuelled the debate about private equity and the ownership of key technologies.

Lady Cobham, daughter-in-law of aviator Sir Alan Cobham, who founded the company, said in 2021: ‘If this was another country, the deal would not have been allowed.’

Advent then swooped on Ultra Electronics. This year it agreed a sale of Ultra’s Signature Management and Power business for ships and submarines to Missouri-based Esco for $550 million (£420 million).

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