Blavatnik’s Access Wins Warner Music for $8.25 a Share
By: Kayla Tausche | General Assignment Reporter
Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries has snagged Warner Music Group for $8.25 a share, according to a person familiar with the matter, ending a three-month auction process featuring a dozen bidders.
The final round of bidding pitted Blavatnik, a minority shareholder, against brothers Alec and Tom Gores, owner of buyout shop Platinum Equity.
Other familiar names peppered the process: BMG, a joint venture between Bertelsmann and KKR , Live Nation , Sony-ATV and music mogul Sean Parker.
Ron Burkle’s Yucaipa Companies submitted a bid for the whole company but bowed out over concerns of firing upper management at Warner, as CNBC previously reported.
Previous rounds of bidding saw price talk around $7.50 a share, meaning Blavatnik’s bid—giving Warner an enterprise value of $3.3 billion—was a considerable bump up.
Warner Music hired Goldman Sachs for the sale, which was set in motion by the prospect of its overseas competitor, EMI, being sold later this year.
Shares of Warner , which were briefly halted Friday morning, were last up more than 2 percent in New York trade.
