UK's IP Group offers to buy rival Touchstone for $587 millon

REUTERS - IP Group said on Tuesday it made an offer of about 466 million pounds ($587 million) for rival intellectual property business company Touchstone Innovations Plc, about a month after its earlier bid was rejected.

The latest all-share offer of 289 pence apiece was a discount of 0.56 percent to Touchstone's closing price on Monday at the London Stock Exchange.

If the deal concludes, IP Group shareholders would own about 67 percent of the combined company, while Touchstone shareholders would own the rest, IP Group said.

As part of the expanded offer, the company said current Touchstone Chief Executive Officer Russ Cummings would join the board of the combined group.

IP Group also said two non-executive directors on the Touchstone Board would become non-executive directors of the combined group.

Touchstone rejected a 500 million pound all-share offer from IP Group in May. However, three of the firm's largest shareholders wanted the company to engage with IP Group.

Touchstone shares are down 1.4 percent since IP Group's announced its initial offer.

IP Group said it has received support from Touchstone shareholders representing, in aggregate, 74.3 percent of Touchstone's issued share capital for the offer.

($1 = 0.7933 pounds)

(Reporting by Sanjeeban Sarkar in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur)