KKR et al Snag PagesJaunes

This just in. The LBO Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and investment bank Goldman Sachs have acquired a majority stake in PagesJaunes for US$4.3 billion, according to this item in Market Watch.

KKR, you may recall, did quite well on Canada’s Yellow Pages Group, selling off that asset through the income trust instrument.

TKG has long described PagesJaunes as a strong global Yellow Pages player, and its results continue to demonstrate this fact. For the recently completed first half of 2006, PJ posted a 6.4 percent growth rate, with a 6.1 percent boost in the French market and a respectable 3.7 percent increase in print.

The company also operates in Spain, Luxembourg and a bunch of other places. We plan to write this up in more detail in our next Local Media Journal.