London, May 14, 2026, 11:06 BST
- Intertek is minded to recommend EQT’s £60-per-share cash proposal, subject to due diligence and final documents.
- The board paused a strategic review that had looked at separating its Energy & Infrastructure business from Testing & Assurance.
- EQT now has until June 11 to make a firm offer or walk away under UK takeover rules.
Intertek Group plc moved closer to a take-private sale to Sweden’s EQT after its board said it would be minded to recommend a £60-per-share cash proposal, reversing course after three earlier rejections. The company will give EQT access to confirmatory due diligence, the final checks a buyer makes before signing binding deal papers.
The turn matters now because the proposal values the London-listed product testing group at about £9.4 billion, or $12.7 billion. If agreed, it would rank as Britain’s third-largest private equity takeover, behind BAA in 2006 and Alliance Boots in 2007, Reuters reported, citing LSEG data.
Intertek is not just a lab stock. It provides assurance, testing, inspection and certification — known in the industry as ATIC — services that help companies check products, assets and supply chains against safety, quality and sustainability standards. The group operates through more than 1,000 laboratories and offices in over 100 countries.
EQT’s latest proposal includes £60 in cash and lets Intertek shareholders keep a final dividend of up to 107.7 pence a share if it is approved at the May 20 annual meeting, without reducing the cash consideration. EQT said the cash element represented a 59% premium to Intertek’s April 9 closing price, the day before its first approach.
Shares in Intertek rose as much as 8% on Wednesday to £57.20, their highest level in more than four years, but still below the proposed cash price. That gap is not large, but it is there. It tells investors the market still sees some execution risk.
The board had been pushing another route. In April, Intertek launched a strategic review to test whether it should separate Intertek Testing & Assurance, with about £1.9 billion of 2025 revenue, from Intertek Energy & Infrastructure, with about £1.6 billion. It also reported 5.4% like-for-like revenue growth in the first quarter; like-for-like revenue compares the same underlying businesses and strips out some distortions such as currency moves.
Chief Executive André Lacroix said in April that two specialist ATIC businesses “could be best positioned to accelerate growth”. That was the standalone case. The board has now put that work on hold while EQT looks under the bonnet. Intertek
Intertek said it still had confidence in its standalone strategy, but that the financial terms now offered cash value at a level it would be prepared to recommend if EQT makes a firm offer on those terms. The company said the proposal remains subject to due diligence and agreed transaction documents.
“It appears that as the offer continued to increase, the pressure ramped up,” Morningstar analyst Ben Slupecki told Reuters, adding that management’s ability to argue it could extract the same value on its own had weakened. Reuters also reported that Intertek had faced pressure from investors including Lost Coast Collective. Reuters
The competitive backdrop is tense. Intertek’s closest global peers include Switzerland’s SGS and France’s Bureau Veritas, which explored a merger last year that would have created a testing and certification company worth more than $30 billion before the talks ended. In a fragmented market, scale remains part of the story.
But the deal is not done. Intertek’s filing said there can be no certainty an offer will be made, even if preconditions are satisfied or waived; if due diligence throws up problems or the final documents stall, the shares could give back part of their bid premium and the company may have to revive the strategic review.
The next hard dates are May 20, when shareholders are due to vote on the final dividend, and June 11, the extended deadline for EQT to put up a firm offer or stand down. For holders, the choice is becoming clear: take near-term cash, or keep betting that Intertek’s own split plan can create more value over time.
