Australia’s Ramsay Health Care has sweetened its offer for London-listed Spire Healthcare to 250p a share from 240p.
Ramsay said on Monday that this was its final offer, unless another company made a bid for Spire. The new offer represents a 30% premium to the closing share price of Spire the day before the initial bid was made.
Spire said in a statement that since the announcement of the initial offer, its board has engaged “extensively” with shareholders and “in particular noted the views of certain shareholders about the price under the initial offer”.
“The board believes that the increased final offer is in the best interests of Spire shareholders as a whole, and accordingly unanimously recommends that shareholders vote in favour of the increased final offer at the Court Meeting and General Meeting due to be held on 12 July 2021,” it said.
Private hospital operator Spire announced in May that it had agreed to be bought by Ramsay for just under £1bn.
