The owner of Birds Eye frozen foods is in talks with Findus to buy its continental European business and the Findus brand.
Nomad Holdings, which only completed the purchase of Birds Eye owner Iglo Foods for $2.8bn on Monday, said talks with Findus were at an early stage and there was no guarantee a deal would be done. Any agreement is not expected to include the Findus UK operations.
The move would fit in with Nomad’s acquisitive plans. On Monday its chief executive Stefan Descheemaeker told Reuters the company was looking for more deals in the frozen foods sector:
It’s a fragmented industry. We know there is value in being a consolidator.
Shares in Nomad, which was founded last year by Martin Franklin and Noam Gottesman, have been suspended at ¢11.885 since April when it unveiled the Iglo deal.
Meanwhile it has also emerged this week that billionaire investor Bill Ackman’s hedge fund Pershing Square owns a 22% stake in Nomad.
