Description of Activities

Description of transaction: The Commission resolved to approve without conditions the acquisition of shareholding by K202583350 (South Africa) Proprietary Limited (SA Bidco) of Honoris Holdings Limited. 

Acquiring group: The acquiring undertaking is K202583350 (South Africa) Proprietary Limited (SA Bidco), a newly incorporated undertaking with no trading history. For completeness, the acquiring undertaking is controlled by Old Mutual Private Equity SPV Proprietary Limited, operating in the financial services industry, providing the following services: life insurance, asset management, retirement funding, short-term insurance, and financial advice. 

Target undertaking: The target undertaking is Honoris Holdings Limited. In Namibia, the target undertaking operates a private higher education institution, namely Regent Business School (Namibia). The target undertaking also operates other private higher education institutions in South Africa, which have limited enrollments of Namibian students in their distance learning programmes.

Relevant market: Defined as the market for the provision of financial services, specifically personal financial services, wealth management, investment solutions, business development services, corporate financial services, and institutional investment management. Additionally, the provision of higher education services in Namibia. 

Merger Determination

The Commission found the proposed transaction unlikely to result in the prevention or substantial lessening of competition or result in any undertaking to acquire or strengthen a dominant position in the market and did not raise any public interest concerns.

However, as stated under section 50 of the Act, this approval does not relieve parties from complying with any other mandatory statutory approvals that any of the parties to this merger must comply with under Namibian laws.