EQT to buy Springer Science and Business Media

"EQT, the private equity arm of Sweden's Wallenberg family, is expected to announce the €2.3bn ($3.4bn) takeover of Springer Science and Business Media, a German business-to-business publisher. The deal ends a tortuous sales process by Springer's two UK-based private equity owners, Cinven and Candover, which will receive only about €100m for their equity. It is the latest sign that Europe's private equity industry is slowly recovering from the credit crisis, which has triggered an almost total freeze on deals for more than a year. Springer has been struggling under about €2.2bn of net debt and its banks have agreed to refinance the company." - FT