Transunion is high bidder for TLO; updates from bankruptcy hearing

Nov. 22--WEST PALM BEACH -- This report from Jeff Ostrowski, who is in federal bankruptcy court today:

Transunion is the high bidder for TLO, offering $154 million. LexisNexis and Warburg Pincus object.

Transunion already has antitrust approval from the Obama adminstration.

LexisNexis offered $180 million, but attorney Robert Furr said the firm has not yet received antitrust approval from the Federal Trade Commission.

The hearing is ongoing, and the judge has yet to approve the deal.

More to come.

Here is the Oct. 17Palm Beach Post report on TLO developments:

1 / 4 -- Thursday, October 17, 2013

Edition: Final

Section: Local & Business

Page: 7B

Source: By Jeff Ostrowski Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Dateline: BOCA RATON

Transunion bids for Boca data firm TLO

Competing firms must top $105 million offer in a November auction

Credit bureau TransUnion has offered $105 million to buy bankrupt data firm TLO, the Boca Raton-based company said in a court filing late Tuesday.

Chicago-based TransUnion offered $90 million in cash and $15 million in stock, a sum that will serve as the opening bid in an auction scheduled for Nov. 20.

TransUnion's offer "will set the floor, or minimum acceptable bid, for the auction, which is designed to achieve the highest and best offer for TLO," the company said in a news release.

Any competing bids must top TransUnion by at least $3 million, and must include at least $93 million in cash, the company said in a bankruptcy filing.

The final offer must be approved by U.S. bankruptcy Judge Paul G. Hyman.

TransUnion's offer calls for TLO to keep its rights to a $40 million life insurance policy on Hank Asher, the company founder who died this year.

TLO said it has received 11 bids, not including a $100 million offer by a group that includes drug billionaire Phil Frost and corporate sleuth Jules Kroll.

They offered $65 million in cash and a $35 million loan secured by Asher's life insurance policy, but TLO said that fell far short of other offers.

TLO mines public and private records to create a database, and sells access to that information to companies running background checks and seeking to collect debts.

The company has gone through ups and downs in recent years. Last year, TLO laid off most of its 200 workers, although the payroll had grown to 125 workers in May when it filed for bankruptcy.

In the bankruptcy filing, TLO listed assets of $46.6 million -- most of it a $40 million life insurance policy on Asher -- and liabilities of $109.9 million. The life insurer has balked at paying the policy because Asher died less than two years after buying the coverage.

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