Water Pik, which makes oral hygiene products and shower heads, is up for sale in a deal that could fetch upwards of $400 million, sources tell Reuters.
1 min read · 12 February 2013
Lenders to Britain's General Healthcare Group are in talks to restructure its around 2 billion pounds ($3.1 billion) of debt, in a process which threatens to leave them nursing heavy losses, Reuters reported. The company, one of Britain's largest independent healthcare services providers, was bought in 2006 by a consortium comprising Apax Partners, Brockton Capital, London & Regional Properties and Netcare. The latter subsequently bought Brockton's share of the business, bankers said. The 2006 deal was backed by 2 billion pounds of borrowings, split 315 million at the operating business - known as BMI Healthcare - and 1.65 billion at the property arm, according to Thomson Reuters LPC data.
3 min read · 12 February 2013
Private equity firm Carlyle Group recently approached Nasdaq OMX Group about taking the exchange operator private, but the talks fell apart over a disagreement on price, Reuters reported. Carlyle initiated the discussions and was in early stages of due diligence when differences emerged, bringing the talks to an end, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.
3 min read · 12 February 2013
Neighborhood social network start-up Nextdoor has raised another $21.3 million, even as many investors shy away from the sector in the wake of troubled Facebook initial public offering last year, Reuters reported. The new funding includes $15 million from Greylock Partners, whose partner David Sze will be joining Nextdoor's board. Sze, known for his involvement in networks LinkedIn and Facebook in their earliest days, said he has never before invested so much in a single investment round. New investors Google Ventures and Bezos Expeditions, Amazon chief Jeff Bezos's venture fund, participated in Nextdoor's latest funding round. So did existing investors Benchmark Capital and Shasta Ventures.
3 min read · 12 February 2013
Spark Capital plans to close its oversubscribed $425 million fourth fund in two weeks, the firm revealed in a correction to a story published in Business Insider, writes Reuters. Spark only revealed it would be raising its fourth fund in December.
1 min read · 12 February 2013
Hostess Brands, the bankrupt maker of Twinkies snack cakes, received court permission on Monday to proceed with auctions for several of its brands, including Twinkies and Wonder Bread, writes Reuters. Private equity firms Apollo Global Management and C. Dean Metropoulos & Co have set a baseline offer of $410 million to buy the company's snack cake brands, Hostess said last month.
2 min read · 12 February 2013
When Square Chief Operating Officer Keith Rabois left his job last month, citing legal threats from a young colleague with whom he had a two-year relationship, he threw a spotlight on the risks associated with the freewheeling startup culture that many entrepreneurs cherish.
5 min read · 11 February 2013
Georgia aims to double foreign direct investments to $2 billion this year, helped by a new sovereign wealth fund it is hiring international banks to promote, the fund's chief executive said on Monday, Reuters reported. The vehicle will succeed the state-owned Partnership Fund, created in 2011 to attract investments from abroad, and focus on co-financing projects in the energy agriculture, real estate and industrial sectors.
2 min read · 11 February 2013
Google Inc. Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt is selling roughly 42 percent of his stake in the Internet search company, a move that could potentially net the former chief executive a $2.51 billion windfall. Schmidt, 57, will sell 3.2 million shares of Class A common stock through a stock trading plan, Google said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday. The plan, which Google said would give Schmidt "individual asset diversification and liquidity," allows Schmidt to spread trades out over a period of one year to reduce the market impact, Reuters reported. Shares of Google were down $4.11 at $781.26 in after-hours trading on Friday.
3 min read · 11 February 2013
A look at the risks associated with the freewheeling startup culture that many entrepreneurs cherish, according to Reuters. Startups often thrive on a lack of rules and boundaries, but experts say that as they make the transition from a handful of people in a room to sizeable businesses, the hazards can grow exponentially, writes Reuters.
5 min read · 11 February 2013
