U.K. supermarket Asda to purchase petrol places operator, E.G., Group U.K.

May 31, 2023: British supermarket company Asda expressed that it would accept petrol station operator, E.G., Group’s U.K. and Ireland business to accelerate its move into the convenience sector, creating a company with combined revenues of nearly 30 billion pounds ($38 billion).

Brothers Zuber Mohsin Issa and private equity group TDR Capital own Asda, Britain’s third-largest grocer, and E.G.

The deal, which includes around 350 petrol stations and over 1,000 food-to-go locations, values E.G., at 2.27 billion pounds, including debt, the groups said on Tuesday.

Asda has said it aims to overtake Sainsbury’s <SBRY.L> to become Britain’s No. 2 supermarket, and the deal will enable it to roll out Asda Express across the E.G., petrol estate.

According to the most recent data by Kantar, Tesco leads the market with a 27.1% share. Sainsbury’s holds 14.8% of the market, ahead of Asda at 13.9%.

Since the Issa brothers bought Asda in 2021, 166 EG sites have already been converted to the “Asda on the Move” format.

The deal comes as consumers grapple with a cost of living crisis that has left grocers trying to juggle the surging price of food with a need to pay higher wages while competing with German discount groups Aldi and Lidl.

Asda, which like rivals, is competitive in the price of petrol sold at its large stores, said it planned to invest over 150 million pounds within the next three years to integrate E.G.

Asda’s shareholders, which include its former owner U.S. retail giant Walmart Inc, will provide around 450 million pounds of additional equity for the deal, it said.

The grocer also reported like-for-like sales growth of 7.8% in the three months to the end of March compared with the previous year, while total revenues excluding fuel increased by 8% to 5.0 billion