Ford weighs up rival offers for UK brands - The Financial Times
30-10-2007

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Ford Motor is weighing up preliminary non-binding offers from Tata Motors and at least four private equity groups for Jaguar and Land Rover after Monday’s deadline. The Indian carmaker, alongside Cerberus Capital Management, TPG, Terra Firma, and One Equity Partners, is understood to have made offers for Ford’s two UK premium brands. India’s Mahindra & Mahindra and buy-out group Ripplewood Holdings also made indicative bids for Jaguar and Land Rover in July, but it was not clear on Monday whether they would make second-round offers. Financial terms of the offers were not available on Monday, and none of the bidders nor Ford are commenting on the sale. Ford, which says it wants to sell the carmakers by the end of this year or the beginning of 2008, is now expected to whittle the bidders down to a shortlist in coming weeks. However, tougher credit markets have altered the conditions for its auction of the brands, as have signals of stricter carbon dioxide emissions standards for cars coming from the European Union. Internal divisions within Ford’s executive ranks over the brands’ future are also complicating the sale, say people familiar with it.