Cut costs
Private equity firm MBK Partners is the new owner of the South Korean branch, Homeplus after paying Tesco 4.2 billion pounds (5.8 billion euro). Those funds will go towards lowering the 17.5 billion pound (24 billion euro) debt Tesco has. The company’s new CEO, Dave Lewis, who took over from Philip Clarke in September 2014, sanctioned the deal and wants to lower costs even more. One of his measures is to cut 9,000 jobs.
In September 2014, Tesco suddenly had to adjust its profit forecast downward after an accounting error. The new number was some 250 million pounds (320 million euro) lower than anticipated, while the chain is also losing ground in the United Kingdom, in part to discounters like Aldi and Lidl.
