So-called 'pandemic plunderers' are reported to have sunk their teeth into some £36bn of Brit businesses that have been sold off since the coronavirus outbreak.
According to reports, 123 UK firms have been bought up and a further 19 deals are said to be in the pipeline, in deals worth nearly £16.6bn.
Among the well-known firms which are said to have been swallowed up in private equity deals are Asda, the AA and the owner of Butlin's.
Security company G4S is also currently being sold for £3.8billion.
The merger between G4S and private-equity backed Allied Universal will create the world’s largest private security company, generating more than $18 billion in revenue and employing more than 750,000 security guards and other staff.
One Tory peer and ex-pensions minister was reported to have sounded a warning about the possible risks of outside companies 'taking advantage'.
The Daily Mail reports that Baroness Altmann said: "It’s really important that Government and businesses are on the lookout for pandemic plunderers.
"Companies are in desperate trouble through no fault of their own because of Covid, and the risk is that some outside companies might take advantage of this to buy our precious assets at knockdown prices."
Dame Margaret Hodge, ex-chairman of the Commons public accounts committee, reportedly said private equity had previously ‘asset-stripped good businesses and loaded them up with debts.’
Professor John Colley, a takeovers expert and associate dean of Warwick Business School, was said to have warned that private equity ownership can lead to unstable finances and management changes.
Private Equity Wire reports that with the easing of lockdown restrictions this year acquisitions from private equity funds will only increase.
Kyra Motley, Partner at Boodle Hatfield, said: “Successful entrepreneurs who are cash rich from exiting their own business are often driven to replicate their first success by buying and building a new business.
“They’ll be looking to pick up assets in the medium-term, particularly with the huge number of distressed assets likely to come onto the market in the second half of the year as Government financial support schemes, such as furlough, come to an end.”
In February Zuber and Mohsin Issa and private equity group TDR Capital completed their purchase of a majority stake in Asda from US giant Walmart in a deal valuing the chain at £6.8bn.
Roadside recovery firm AA Plc also agreed to be acquired by private equity groups Warburg Pincus International and TowerBrook Capital Partners, it was previously reported.
