Bond sold to Inaer ?

[nodrama]

It seems that the brothers have used their company as collateral to buy into something bigger, but at the same time hopefully securing the expansion and success of the Bond part of it.

[BolkowBill]

Nubian: Totally different situation. The investment is needed to buy new aircraft throughout the Bond fleet (earlier link to press story last autumn) so it's not being bought out by a competitor but joining forces with two other companies, all owned by big investment firms. Whether that makes it better or not remains to be seen though..... !!

[Savoia]

.
More from today's Sunday Times:

Spanish helicopter operator Inaer, 51% owned by Investindustrial and 49% by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, is said to be in late-stage talks with Stephen and Peter Bond to acquire UK rival Bond Aviation for nearly £300m (€341.6m).

The Bond brothers had mandated NM Rothschild late last year to undertake a strategic review of the business.

Sav

[nodrama]

If Inaer is 100% owned by Investindustrial and KKR, then it won't be Inaer that acquires Bond??

Inaer is part of a holding company group that also includes Australian Helicopters...all owned by the two investment companies.

[lowfat]

Check out the Helihub news thread its all there.

[Savoia]

.
And posted here for your convenience:

Bond Aviation Group, the UK company encompassing the onshore operator Bond Air Service and its sister company Bond Offshore Helicopters, is set to be sold by Stephen and Peter Bond for a figure thought to be around £300 million (approx $480M). The buyers are the two private equity groups that own Spanish operator INAER, which is 51% owned by Investindustrial and 49% by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.

This follows an announcement in November 2010 that the owning family had hired NM Rothschild as advisers to look at strategic options for the business, with the expectation at that time that they were willing to sell between 30 and 60% of the business. This week it appears that the whole group is to be sold, and will continue operations under the Bond names and operated alongside INAER. The most recently available annual accounts show the group with a turnover of £91.3M and pre-tax profits of £22M. It also had net debts of £112.9M at the end of March 2010.

Bond is split into two primary areas, Bond Air Services, operating EC135s and a handful of Bo105s for the police and air ambulance sectors, plus some individual contacts supporting lighthouses and windfarms.

Bond Offshore Helicopters operates EC225s, AS332L2s and AS365N3s on the North Sea and the Irish Sea, and is soon to be introducing their first AW139 to the operational fleet. The first aircraft, leased from Era Helicopters and still in their colours, has been conducting pilot type conversions out of Norwich Airport in the last week in preparation for their contract with Perenco.

The Bond brothers are expected to continue with the business for an agreed minimum period of time, in a move with closely matches the sale of their original Bond Helicopters group 15 years ago to CHC. The most recent “Rich List” for the UK, published 11 months ago, estimates the Bond family worth at £151M.

Source: Helihub

Sav

[Nubian]

The Bond brothers are expected to continue with the business for an agreed minimum period of time, in a move with closely matches the sale of their original Bond Helicopters group 15 years ago to CHC.

Yep, a.....

Totally different situation.

me bad......

[BolkowBill]

The Bond brothers are expected to continue with the business for an agreed minimum period of time, in a move with closely matches the sale of their original Bond Helicopters group 15 years ago to CHC.

As I understand it this is journalistic error (such as we see all the time) as the original deal with CHC was quite the opposite; the Bond brothers didn't remain at all involved and had to sign a five-year agreement not to venture offshore during that period. After it had expired they were able to begin again on the N Sea but the CHC deal was reported as a hostile takeover whereas this looks like a voluntary agreement by the brothers and is therefore likely to be far more beneficial to the company (or at least the Bond brothers!) than the CHC situation.
I think that makes sense

[Hummingfrog]

B-Bill I think you have the history of the "Old" Bond wrong. The initial sale by the Bond brothers was to the Norwegians HKS and the Bond name and involvement was kept. CHC (who owned Brintel) then bought HKS this was when the Bond influence was removed as Brintel management became the dominant force. The merged companies became CHC Scotia and the red and blue crews merged into one entity.

Even though the Bonds used the phrase " we are all one family and we will look after you" none of the sale proceeds filtered down to the work force who had helped Bond become a successful company. I hope the present work force is treated better

HF

[detgnome]

You are probably not the only one thinking that....

[SFIM]

Seems to me that the bond brothers will have cashed out twice now, bet there are no bonuses for staff, yet they still like to push the "family company" image which means that you are expected to "help them out" on your day off if they call, and you are not allowed live too far away (because they don't like it) all this in exchange for substantially less pay than CHC/bristow. Seems all a bit one way too me.

[Brilliant Stuff]

The quote about not living to far away because they don't like it is a bit of a red herring chap. The Rulebook says you can't live to far way due to fatigue.

[SFIM]

The quote about not living to far away because they don't like it is a bit of a red herring chap. The Rulebook says you can't live to far way due to fatigue.

It is not a red herring at all, they contractually require you to live locally, so this stops people living in one part of the country and then travelling up and staying locally in a B&B or a rental for your days on and then travelling back for your days off, which is all common practice in CHC/Bristow, as who would want to spend their days off in Aberdeen CHC have a few people who live in france on days off. It's all so they can call you on your days off so that they can prevail upon you to "help them out"

[Variable Load]

I am sure there are those that STILL think the Bond brothers walk on water and will follow them to the end of ........ well anything!

[heli1]

Getting back to the original thread,it seems (according to my source) the Bond Group is to partner with World Helicopters,with the two brothers going on the WH Board and Bond Offshore and Bond Air services becoming subsidiary companies under Peter Bond alongside Inaer and Australian Helicopters.Tehre is no buyout and the deal is not yet done but both sides are intending to invest to grow the business.

[PANews]

I have not seen the words he used but from the heli1 post I would tend to go with the reported Elfan ap Rees/Helidata version.

The parties involved were all in Florida and talking of refinance not yet another company deletion.

[TwoStep]

Just been announced...

World Helicopters acquires Bond Aviation Group for €300m | Shephard Group

[TTFD]

Well, will it help Bond Offshore out with the court cases coming up against them?

Copter tragedy pair suing for £4m - Press & Journal

[Vie sans frontieres]

Bond, the UK's largest independent emergency and mission critical helicopter operator

Is this true?

[heli1]

PA News was right...its word for word what was published in Helidata on 30th march.