Thomson Reuters Corp Chairman David Thomson urged the company`s board of directors to seek better terms for its $17 billion sale of a large chunk of its business to Blackstone Group LP, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people close to the deal.
Blackstone last month agreed to buy a majority stake in Thomson Reuters` Financial & Risk division, which competes against privately held Bloomberg in providing bankers and investors with news, data and analytics.
Executives with Woodbridge Co, a private Toronto firm that holds the Thomson family`s majority stake in Thomson Reuters, disagreed with David Thomson and supported the deal, the newspaper said. The Thomson family owns 64 percent of Thomson Reuters through Woodbridge.
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Woodbridge CEO David Binet, who is also deputy chairman of Thomson Reuters, could not be reached for comment. A spokesman for Thomson Reuters declined comment.
Thomson eventually voted in favour of the deal, but only after telling other directors he was concerned they had not sought a higher price or considered other potential buyers for the business, according to the newspaper, which did not identify its sources.
Blackstone last summer initiated talks to buy a majority of the Financial & Risk business, a deal strongly supported by Thomson Reuters Chief Executive Jim Smith and directors including Woodbridge`s Binet, according to the newspaper.
Reuters News will remain a unit of Thomson Reuters and provide news to the Financial & Risk business after the deal is completed.
(This article has not been edited by Zeebiz editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)
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