Tantalum bids for Quindell's telematics unit

Δημοσιεύθηκε: 17 Απριλίου 2015 - 15:53

A connected-vehicle company owned by City financier Edmund Truell has made an offer to buy most of the remaining business of Quindell, the scandal-hit insurance claims processor.

Tantalum, part of Mr Truell's Disruptive Capital Finance umbrella, has approached Aim-quoted Quindell with an offer for its telematics business, which uses black boxes to monitor driver behaviour and broker car insurance.

Quindell said it is not ready to sell the assets - including Himex, Ingenie and Iter8 - as neither party knows exactly how much profit the businesses make, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Once an investor favourite with an equity value of more than £2.7bn, Quindell was thrown into turmoil a year ago following an attack by short seller Gotham City Research, which questioned its financial reporting.

Since then, shares in Quindell have shed almost 80 per cent of their value; founder and chairman Rob Terry has been ejected from the business and PwC declared some of its accounting practices as "not appropriate".

At an extraordinary general meeting on Friday, 99 per cent of shareholders approved the sale of most of the company's business to Slater & Gordon, an Australian law firm. That deal is expected to complete next month following regulatory clearances, leaving Quindell with a rump of car insurance and healthcare businesses.

Tantalum's approach for some of the remaining operations is thought to be worth in the region of £50m-£60m, according to another person familiar with the terms of the offer.

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>That valuation would represent an effective writedown for Quindell, which invested in Himex and Ingenie at a combined valuation of more than £300m, although most of the payment was in shares. Both Himex and Ingenie are run by long-time associates of Mr Terry.

Quindell's current market capitalisation implies that the car businesses have little, if any, value. The company's equity was worth about £560m as of Friday afternoon, less than the £637m that it expects to receive from Slater & Gordon next month.

Still, black-box car insurance business is seen to have big growth potential. Quindell once had a telematics joint venture with the RAC, the respected roadside recovery service, to link up breakdown and accident victims with courtesy cars and healthcare services.

<>But the joint venture unravelled in September following the sharp decline in both Quindell's share price and its reputation.

Quindell tried to buy Tantalum last year, according to one of the people familiar with the matter, but the all-share transaction fell apart a week before the release of Gotham City's report.

The offer from Tantalum is understood to include a solar panel and insulation business, an electricity broker and a physical therapy business in Canada, highlighting the diverse nature of Quindell's interests. It is unclear what assets would remain with Quindell in the event of a sale of the telematics business.

Both Quindell and Tantalum declined to comment.

David Currie, Quindell's interim chairman, told investors on Friday that the company was not in detailed talks for the disposal of any other assets. He said that Quindell was still "some months away" from filing its 2014 financial results.

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