Embattled Aryzta hires advisers to help it offload unwanted assets

Aryzta said on Thursday evening it has hired advisers help the embattled baked goods group to sell unwanted assets to allow it to simplify its business and concentrate on “core markets”.

The company has appointed investment banks Houlihan Lokey and Alantra to advise on the matter, it said.

The stage had been set for the company to focus on unit sales – including Aryzta's troubled North American operations – after talks on a potential outright takeover by a unit of US activist hedge fund group Elliott Management broke down in late October.

The group's new chairman, Urs Jordi, who joined the company in mid-September as part of a boardroom coup and who was known to be against a sale, has made little secret of his ambition to slim down the group and lower its debt pile.