Anglian Water Group (AWG) has sold off Morrison Utility Services in the latest chapter of its tumultuous ownership of the former Morrison Group.
The division, which does work such as pipe repairs for electricity, gas, telephone and water companies in the United Kingdom and Ireland, has been sold for £235m to European private equity firms Cognetas and Englefield Capital.
The move comes two years after AWG sold Morrison Construction, which was thought to be the core of the company, for just £42m.
AWG chief executive Jonson Cox is claiming to have overseen a turnaround in the fortunes of the utility division since he joined the company in 2004 and rejected the chance to sell the entire former Morrison Group. Since then Utility Services has seen its turnover double to £500m.
He said: "When we first took the decision to retain the Morrison business within AWG, our primary goal was to focus it on repair and maintenance activities. This generated significant shareholder value."
Four years ago Cox was offered £100m for all the Morrison businesses. Now the company is thought to be anticipating reaping at least four times that amount when it sells off the remaining units when dividends from private finance initiative projects and the like are included.
Cox's predecessor, Chris Mellor, paid £235m for the Edinburgh-headquartered company in 2000, but a series of writedowns on its value contributed to his ousting in 2003.
Cox had been expected to sell off the company but ended up launching a court case, which was settled out of court, against its former owner Sir Fraser Morrison, claiming the business was less profitable than AWG had been led to believe.
AWG still owns Morrison Facilities Services, which provides a repair and maintenance service to homes and businesses in the UK, and the group's former property division, although it claims to have received a number of offers which undervalue the divisions.
These will eventually be sold, as the Osprey consortium - the collection of pension funds and private equity companies which bought AWG in 2006 - wants a to pare it down to a pure utility company with a steady stream of income.
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