Texas Pacific Joins the Party for Sainsbury’s Bid

By Evening Standard, London

Feb. 7–Texas Pacific Group has joined forces with the private-equity team mulling over a £10 billion bid for Sainsbury’s.

The US group, which was thought to be considering putting together its own consortium to approach the supermarkets giant, has linked up with CVC Capital Partners, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Blackstone.

Goldman Sachs, which is advising the consortium, is also in talks on using its own private-equity fund to bankroll part of the bid. The emergence of TPG and Goldman as partners to CVC, KKR and Blackstone is likely to hamper efforts by rival groups to form a competing consortium. TPG had been tipped to tie up with Cinven and Bain Capital.

A successful bid would hand a windfall to Qatar’s ruling family after Sheikh Hamad ibn Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani, the Gulf state’s first Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, invested £90 million in Sainsbury’s through derivatives contracts.

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