Diamond Bus North West

[gilesbus1]

RE: Diamond Bus North West

(11/07/2019 23:34)Winston Wrote:  Stagecoach was the first to be tied to a potential Arriva deal when it first went up for sale.
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mark...-sale.html

It's wouldn't be Stagecoach direct if done via Souter Holdings potentially acting as broker to break-up & sell some parts, whilst retaining other parts. Souter only holds 15.2% of Stagecoach Plc and doesn't have a controlling stake. There is also the possibility the Stagecoach could be interested in Arriva European Ops, as present they are now solely reliant on the UK for their business having being excluded and now refusing to bid for anymore UK franchises.

If you look at the major shareholding in Stagecoach PLC & First Group, Threadneedle Asset Management Ltd. own 18.2% & 8.83% respectively.

I think you're forgetting that NX have been buying commuter / corporate coach companies in the UK the past couple of years i.e. Kings Ferry / Clarkes of London / Stewarts & Woods Coaches. Also during the timeframe your refer to, NX owned & grew Travel London incorporating Connex London & TGM London which was sold to Abellio in 2009 under CEO Richard Bowker. Additionally, NX were involved in the early stages of bidding for First Manchester depots, but dropped out as they were seen to be too expensive, they also bid for Manchester Metrolink contract. Whilst NX have largely been expanding overseas mainly US & Spain, you need to remember that their CEO Dean Finch is ex First Group and knows the business well, opportunities to buy large profitable urban bus businesses in the UK such as Bristol, Glasgow, West Yorkshire etc don't come around very often. These share similar operating characteristics to national Express West Midlands i.e. high frequency, urban, some are former PTE areas. NX are interested in anything at the right price, I think they may show a hand and surprise. Go-Ahead Group Group would make a good merger partner for NX, as they have some good quality UK Bus ops. But as previously said, NX are in the unique position that they could buy large parts / all of First Group or Arriva UK with little or no overlap of opoco's / services.

I am just puzzled though with National Express why nothing really has happened bus wise in the UK for such a long time, and indead they have actually sold operations off to Abellio in the case of London and Arriva in the case of several other operations over the years, rather than bought anything.

Coaches have always appeared to be the main focus, and indeed National Express is probably the UK's main major player in Express City to City Coach operations although Stagecoach's presence has got bigger, and they are the dominant player in Scotland as a result of the deal with Scottish City Link and Parks effectively paralleling them under agreement.

National Express do have lots of operations in Morocco and Eastern Europe and also in Malta, so maybe a better move might be Arriva's European operations as they might bolt on nicely to what they already have. I still feel a merger with Go Ahead is the best option for UK growth for National Express, First seem to want over asset price for what they are selling in order to clear debts, and maybe that will in effect place many opp's into debt. If I was a large operator looking to buy the two king operations in First and Arriva that could generate the most money are simply First Glasgow and Arriva Merseyside, these are the units that carry the biggest profits in those two companies, If I was picking a third option then First West Yorkshire would be it, outside of Merseyside Arriva probably have very little of high value operations as they are heavily based on rural operations in the South East were car use is high and in the Midlands were outside of the Fox County and Derby section the opp's are extremely rural although there are services into Birmingham.

If I thought I could turn an operation from Loss to Profit I would pick probably Arriva's Milton Keynes operations as City expansion will give more opportunity for growth in the years ahead and economies car be made with garage sites there. e.g. closing the current sites and moving to a single site depot outside the town boundary on a new development site which could be picked up cheaply, also then looking at the fleet make up there and the road layout's which have lead to minibus operation in the past and working with the Borough Council to see how that situation could be made safer, easier and more efficient, maybe looking at the use of a guided busway to link Newport Pagnell, Milton Keynes City Centre and Bletchley maybe one option, and also the use of a click type service might be another, especially for usage after dark.