Reports suggest the sale of British Car Auctions has moved forward with several parties having already put bids on the table.

However, the owner of BCA is refusing to deny that several equity groups have already expressed an interest in buying it.

In September Fleet News reported that BCA’s owner, Montagu Private Equity, had begun a review of the company with a view to putting it up for sale.

Montagu has owned BCA for three years and it is now clear it intends to sell Europe’s largest vehicle remarketing operation.

A number of private equity groups are reported to be interested and are expected to place their final offers – likely to be between £400 and £500 million according to the Financial Times – on the table before the end of November.

Montagu paid £450 million for BCA in 2006.
Cinven – one of the companies expected to place a bid – already has experience of running large auction companies.

It bought the NCA Group – National Car Auctions – in 1996.

Under its management, NCA grew, repaid all of its acquisition debt and completed an acquisition of another auction house.

In 1998 Cinven offloaded NCA to Independent Car Auctions.

However, another private equity company - Clayton Dubilier & Rice – is also likely to be favoured.

It has run Hertz since it bought it from Ford in 2005.

Hertz has a strong relationship with BCA, which remarkets ex-Hertz rental vehicles.

See November 19 issue of Fleet News for a full insight into BCA's remarketing strategy.