UK brewer Scottish and Newcastle plans to whittle down bidders in the 2.3 billion pound ($3.64 billion) sale of its pubs business after a bid deadline on Friday, sources close to the talks said on Thursday, August 21, under Reuters report.
In a sale that has drawn interest from a wide group of private equity and trade bidders, the brewer is expected to select two or three parties to go through to a final round of bidding, and plans to complete the sale in the autumn, the sources said.

Scottish and Newcastle, owner of some of Europe's biggest beer brands, including Kronenbourg and Foster's, announced in April it planned to sell its 1,450 pubs to focus on its core brewing operations. It said it hoped to raise more than 2.3 billion pounds from the sale.

22 August, 2003