Founder of Iceland Foods ‘confident’ over buyout

Mr Walker, who with other managers owns about 23 per cent of the business, has said he is confident of raising funds to buy out Landsbanki, which took control of the stake following the collapse of Icelandic investment group Baugur.

A Sunday newspaper said it was not known how much finance Deutsche might offer. The paper added that Mr Walker had also held talks with private equity firms about a joint bid, but would prefer to use bank and bond financing.

Officials responsible for winding up Landsbanki launched an auction in May for a 67 per cent stake in Iceland Foods.

Mr Walker tabled a bid for Landsbanki’s stake which valued all of Iceland Foods at about £1bn and has a pre-emption right to match any other bid.

Some analysts say the business could fetch more than £1.5bn, with grocers such as Leeds-based Asda, Sainsbury’s and Bradford-based Morrisons all hungry for more stores.

Huddersfield-born Mr Walker was not immediately available for comment. Deutsche Bank did not respond to calls for comment.

This month, Morrisons announced its appointment of Credit Suisse as adviser to its bid. It drafted in the investment bank because its regular bankers are conflicted.

Mr Walker has appointed Morrisons’ investment bankers Rothschild as advisers to his bid, while Morrisons’ joint broker Bank of America Merrill Lynch is working for Landsbanki.

Asda said in June that it would look at buying parcels of stores from other chains that may become available.

Meanwhile, Morrisons confirmed yesterday that the group is considering locating family doctors in its stores.

Sainsbury’s is already trialling a scheme offering free places to free space to GPs wanting to run a surgery in supermarkets. It has doctors in stores at Heaton Park, Greater Manchester, and Colne, Lancashire, and plans more later this year.

A Morrisons spokesman said: “The only thing I can say is that we are looking at the issue of GP location, that there are a number of potential avenues and we haven’t made decisions about any of them.”