By Kane Wu and Yantoultra Ngui
HONG KONG/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Hillhouse and Japan’s Mitsui & Co have emerged as final bidders vying for Singapore-headquartered traditional Chinese medicine chain Eu Yan Sang International, in a deal that could fetch over $700 million, two people with knowledge of the matter said.
Eu Yan Sang’s shareholders, led by Singapore-based asset manager Tower Capital Asia, will conduct management presentations with the bidders next week, said one of the sources.
Final binding bids are due by February before Lunar New Year, the sources said.
A third bidder is also in the mix to buy Eu Yan Sang, according to one of the sources and a third person familiar with the transaction, but Reuters could not verify the identity.
All the sources declined to be named as the process was private.
Hillhouse declined to comment. Eu Yan Sang, Tower Capital and Mitsui did not immediately respond to requests seeking comment.
The traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) business, which has been around for over 140 years, now runs a distribution network with over 170 retail outlets in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, and Singapore.
It also operates 30 TCM clinics in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and mainland China and a food and beverage outlet in Malaysia, its website shows.
A consortium consisting of Tower Capital, a unit of Temasek Holdings, and Eu Yan Sang’s group chief executive officer, Richard Eu, took the company private from the Singapore bourse in 2016. The deal valued Eu Yan Sang at about $196 million at the time.
Mitsui has an indirect interest in Eu Yan Sang by way of having participated in 2022 in a Tower Capital Asia fund that is an investor in Eu Yan Sang, according to a statement at that time.
Hillhouse, an investment firm founded by China-born dealmaker Lei Zhang, has a minority interest in Eu Yan Sang, having first invested in the company before its delisting in 2016.
(Reporting by Kane Wu in Hong Kong and Yantoultra Ngui in Singapore; Editing by Sonali Paul)
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