Magnetic sale

The Morgan Crucible Company has agreed to sell its Magnetics division to One Equity Partners for £225 million.

Warren Knowlton, Chief Executive Officer of Morgan, said that the sale of the Magnetics division would also reduce the company’s pension and employee benefit liabilities by around £75 million.

Completion of the transaction, which is subject among other things to shareholder approval and clearance from the competition authorities in Germany and Austria, is expected in November 2005.

The sale price represents a multiple of 1.7x sales and 21.1x EBITA for the year ended 4 January 2005.

Morgan was founded in 1856 and is based in Windsor, near London, in the UK. It is divided into 5 Global Business Units (GBUs) that design, develop and supply a broad range of products made from carbon, ceramic and magnetic materials. It has sites located all over the world and employs approximately 12,500 people.