The Restaurant Group has announced the takeup for its rights Issue – to fund the acquisition of Wagamama - at 92%.
The new ordinary shares began trading this morning and TRG now expects to hit its target of completing the Wagamama acquisition by next Friday.
Underwriter JP Morgan will now try to procure subscribers for the remaining 23,169,687 new ordinary shares not taken up in the rights Issue, failing which it has agreed to subscribe for any remaining unsubscribed shares.
TRG received approval for its £559m bid to acquire Wagamama from 60% of its shareholders at the end of last month.
The company said it noted the votes against the deal and would work with investors to address their concerns.
TRG has said investing in differentiated propositions aligned to consumer trends was critical to its future success, and that Wagamama was well-positioned to benefit from a number of consumer trends, including the increased focus on healthy options, high interest in Asian food, and the consumer demand for speedy service and convenience through delivery.
TRG also said it believed there is headroom to grow the size of Wagamama’s UK estate by approximately 40 to 60 additional restaurants without saturation. In addition it expects to convert at least 15 TRG sites to the Wagamama brand.
Wagamama currently operates 138 directly-operated restaurants in the UK and the US and 58 franchised restaurants in Europe, the Middle East and New Zealand. TRG said that as at 19 August 2018, 73% of sites had greater than 10 years left on their lease contracts.
