Cinven and GfK ponder TNS bid

Private-equity firm Cinven is looking at a joint bid with Germany's GfK for market researcher Taylor Nelson Sofres.

GfK needs up to £600 million from a joint-venture partner if it is to trump last week's £1.05 billion offer for TNS from Sir Martin Sorrell's WPP after a friendly merger deal fell through.

Under that plan, the bulk of head-office operations would have moved from Nuremberg to London. GfK is also in talks over possible financing with Gunter Herz, the billionaire heir to the Tchibo coffee empire, about the involvement of the Mayfair investment vehicle he controls with his sister Daniela Herz.

GfK chief executive Klaus W¸bbenhorst said last week that "GfK wants to have a longterm investor" and "the name Gunter Herz did come up".

However, a deal with Cinven or Mayfair could raise questions at home in Germany as to whether a tie-up with private equity would be politically unacceptable to GfK's largest shareholder, the GfK-Verein charitable trust.