Express Mortgages Express Loans Bingo Lose Weight Franchising Dating Shopping Book Shop Find Spare Parts Cut Your Bills Wine Shop Legal Store FlatShare Cruises

BOOTS GOES PRIVATE WITH FINAL FLOURISH

Boots has had a good year

Thursday May 3,2007

By Andrew Johnson

Comment Speech Bubble Have your say(0)

ALLIANCE BOOTS will end its life as a public company on a high after year-end results beat City forecasts.

The company agreed an £11billion, 1139p-a-share takeover deal with its largest shareholder and deputy chairman, Stefano Pessina, and US private equity group KKR last week.

Yesterday underlying profits rose 7.4 per cent to £641million for the year to March. Turnover was up 3.6 per cent to £14.6billion. Shares rose 2p to 1122dp.

Chief executive Richard Baker said the results vindicated the decision to focus “much more” on health and beauty.
“We decided to put the chemist back into Boots The Chemist,” he said. “Healthcare now makes up more than half our sales.”

The company’s results were further boosted by the sell-out success of its No 7 Protect and Perfect anti-ageing cream after BBC’s Horizon programme discovered it was the only tested product to actually work.

Baker said Boots was stepping up production of its Soltan sun cream ranges and hayfever treatments in anticipation of a hot summer. He added: “We are also about to launch the fastest expansion of our pharmacy business since Jesse Boot ran the company in the 1920s.”

For all his success in turning round the once-struggling Boots and forging last year’s merger with Alliance Unichem, it is unclear whether Baker will be in charge after the takeover.

He admitted he had yet to talk to Pessina and KKR about his future, adding: “It would be premature to make a comment.”

Analysts said he faced a possible rival for the job in the form of health and beauty director Scott Wheway, who is understood to have impressed investors.

KKR and Pessina are still in talks with pension fund trustees but Baker said the liabilities on the fund were now less than £30million.

Baker appeared to agree with his chairman, Sir Nigel Rudd, who described City retail analysts as “stupid” earlier this week for refusing to recognise the value of Alliance Boots.

“From when we first proposed the merger, we thought it would create a very valuable and unique company,” he said.