Galen Weston, the Canadian billionaire who owns the Brown Thomas store in Dublin, has agreed a cash offer for Britain's upmarket department store Selfridges. The deal is worth £598m sterling, or 387 pence per share.
The deal, which ends weeks of speculation surrounding the stores, would also assume Selfridges' net debt, estimated to be around £30.1m.
Weston's firm, Wittington Canada, said it had no plans to change strategy or management at Selfridges. The firm also said it had no plans to combine Selfridges with Dublin's Brown Thomas.
'We certainly hope that the two businesses could learn from each other and help each other,' Wittington Canada President and Director Anthony Graham said this morning.
Selfridges Chairman Alun Carthcart said Weston's offer was 'fair and reasonable' and represented a 60% premium to the company's stock market value five weeks ago.
The UK chain has been at the centre of bid speculation in recent weeks after Scottish entrepreneur Tom Hunter came in with an offer said to be in the region of 330-350 pence a share.
There have been no other confirmed bids, although the billionaire Reuben brothers did express an interest. A management buyout team led by Chief Executive Peter Williams and a consortium led by Goldman Sachs have also been named as possible bidders.
Weston, who is worth $5 billion, already owns Canada's largest supermarket chain Loblaws, fashion retailer Holt Renfrew in Toronto and Associated British Foods in the UK.
