Northern’s failed suitor Greencore turns in a loss

Greencore had hoped to merge with Northern to create Essenta Foods, a £1.7bn chilled food specialist with substantial operations in Yorkshire. Greencore lost out to Ranjit Singh Boparan. His £342m bid for Northern Foods gained shareholder approval in March. Greencore had been the original favoured bidder, but Mr Boparan’s offer blew it out of the water.

In the half year ended March 25, Greencore recorded group sales of 442m euros, a 7.9 per cent increase on the previous year. Group operating profit, before exceptional items and acquisition related amortisation, was 27m euros, a 1.7 per cent increase on the previous year.

A net exceptional cost of 17.5m euros was recorded during the period.

This related to costs which included an assessment of the potential acquisition of Northern Foods. The group result for the first half was a loss of 300,000 euro (around £261,000) compared to a profit of 25.2m euros in the same period last year.

Patrick Coveney, the group chief executive officer, said: “Our business continues to perform well, despite some of the recent challenges in the UK and US food markets.

“We are delighted to have delivered sales growth for the first half of 7.9 per cent, and in particular, to have driven this through to a 42 per cent growth in continuing adjusted earnings per share.

“Clearly, in the last six months we devoted considerable time and resources to corporate development activity and it was disappointing not to be able to execute a combination with Northern Foods.

“However, we learnt an enormous amount from the process and we are optimistic about our ability to drive growth and shareholder value from both our existing business and from corporate development in the months and years ahead.”

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