CVC Capital Holdings, the private equity company that owns the Formula One motor-racing world championship, has tabled a bid to acquire the Infront Sports & Media agency, according to a report by the Sky News channel in the UK.
The report said that CVC is one of several bidders interested in the agency, which is operated by the Bridgepoint private equity firm.
Sky News also named talent management company CAA as one of the bidders. Investment bank Lazard, which is reportedly looking after the possible sale of Infront, asked interested parties to submit initial offers last week.
Other investment companies such as Blackstone and Bain Capital have not submitted offers, the report said.
CVC was one of the bidders for the IMG agency last year. It is unclear whether IMG, which is owned by Entertainment talent agency William Morris Endeavor and private equity firm Silver Lake Partners, has submitted a bid for Infront, the report added.
Infront chief executive Philippe Blatter said in a letter to clients last month: “Bridgepoint and the Infront Management… commenced a process to review different options for the company to find the appropriate support for its next phase of growth. Encouragingly, a substantial number of organisations have already actively expressed their interest in supporting the company, which makes us consider the overall current market situation as favourable for this review.”
Bridgepoint is understood to be seeking offers of about £850m (€1.08bn/$1.37bn) for Infront, about double the figure paid by the investment vehicle when it acquired the agency three years ago.