The Kenya Competition Authority recently approved for several corporate deals to be completed. Some of them were mere rubber stamping formalities, as the deals originated far away or had little in the way of local competition that would compel the authority to intervene.
They covered a variety of sectors including:
Agro-Processing
- (The acquisition of) The flower growing business of Finlay’s Horticulture Kenya by Lamorna
- (The acquisition of the) Residual business of Agrifresh Kenya by Finlays
- (The acquisition of) Sarkish Flora Ltd by Africa Blooms Limited.
Oil & Mining
– Acquisition of 100% of Cove Energy Plc by Shell Exploration & Production (Thailand)
– Acquisition of 100% of Dominion Petroleum by Ophir Energy Plc.
– Pacific Wildcat Resources Corporation acquiring 100% of Stirling Capital (UK) and Cortec Pty (UK)
– Elsewhere, there are new (and controversial) that have been proposed that mandate for local shareholders to own 25% of petroleum companies and 35% of mining companies (read more)
Money & Finance
- Acquisition of 100% of Aureos Capital by Abraaj Capital
- Acquisition of Grant Thornton Kenya by PKF & Associates (which continues to be in an expansion mode even after taking over DCDM)
- (The acquisition of) Additional shares in Pan Africa Insurance Holdings by Hubris Holdings
- Acquisition of Credit Reference Bureau (Holdings) Limited by Transunion Netherlands (part of the credit giant Transunion
- 62.52% of Micro Africa by Letshego Holdings (of Botswana)
Tourism
- (100%) of Ol-Seki Ltd by Hemingways Holdings
Manufacturing & Engineering
- The acquisition of selected assets of Raffia Bags Kenya by Polycem Bags
- The acquisition of 62% of Civicon Ltd by Transcentury Engineering & Contracting
Service
- The acquisition of 75% of Nairobi Java House by Emerging Capital Partners Africa Fund III. The deal won the AI deal of the year award and last weekend was featured on the Citizen TV piece called Who owns Kenya (video)
Others
- Shoden Data Systems (Proprietary) by Hitachi Data Systems Europe (a sub-Saharan territory deal)
- Kingfisher Properties by Mahesh Sanghrajka & Aasheet Sanghrajka.
- Centro Suburb Ltd by Westlands Triangle Properties
On-Going
Following on three earlier deals:
- Barclays & Absa are back in the news, six years later
- The shareholders of three bottling companies in Kenya have agreed with a Coca Cola plan to merge them under a single company Almasi, with one board of directors and CEO and cut other costly production redundancies
- No word on Kenol.
In the News
Other ongoing deals, yet to be concluded include:
Money & Finance
- Deloitte East Africa merging with Haile Solomon & Tekeste (Ethiopia)
- The I&M Bank and City Trust deal
- I&M Bank Limited buying 55% of Banque Commerciale du Rwanda
- EcoBank Kenya pursuing an undisclosed local investment bank
- UAP Holdings pursuing an undisclosed Tanzanian insurance company
Other
- Australian firm Aviva Corporation (Australia) selling stakes of Kenyan subsidiary to Africa Barrick Gold (ABG)
- Copy Cat buying 51% stake of Seal Africa
- Low cost airline, FastJet which took over the routes of Fly540 in Kenya and Tanzania, also plans to take over the collapsed operations of South Africa’s 1-time airline for $0.12
- The Woolworth – Deacons deal