Rotork agrees to GBP4 billion cash buyout from ABB
ABB Ltd on Thursday announced a more than £4 billion deal to acquire London-listed Rotork PLC, which it deems "highly complementary" to its Automation offering.
The Zurich-based electrical engineering firm will pay 506 pence in cash for Rotork, valuing the firm at £4.14 billion on a fully diluted basis. The deal values Bath, England-based flow control solutions provider Rotork at £4.08 billion on an enterprise basis.
Rotork shares rose 0.8% to 290.80 pence each in London on Wednesday, giving it a £2.38 billion market capitalisation. It is a FTSE 250 listing. The deal price is a 73% premium to its Wednesday closing price.
"Rotork's mission-critical flow control and instrumentation solutions are highly complementary to ABB's automation portfolio, strengthening ABB's position at the field-device layer and enhancing the 'sense-control-act' automation loop," ABB said.
"Rotork would expand ABB's Automation offering for large and complex industrial and infrastructure applications, while increasing exposure to attractive end markets and improving the mix of ABB's Automation business area through higher-margin products, services and lifecycle revenues."
Rotork will operate as a separate division in ABB's Automation business. It is expected to add 3% to ABB's group revenue, 12% for the Automation division alone.
In 2025, Rotork achieved pretax profit of £157.9 million on revenue of £777.3 million. ABB's annual revenue totalled USD33.22 billion, USD8.08 billion from Automation alone.
Rotork Chair Dorothy Thompson said: "The Rotork board believes that the offer from ABB reflects the high quality of Rotork.
"The combination brings together two companies whose purposes are closely aligned, with a shared focus on automation and electrification to enable more sustainable and efficient operations. The Rotork board believes that ABB's decentralised operating model and commitment to run Rotork as a separate division will benefit the Rotork group's business, employees and wider stakeholders. As a result, the Rotork board has unanimously agreed to recommend the offer to Rotork shareholders."
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