Cineworld has snapped up the arthouse cinema chain Picturehouse, owner of the Ritzy cinema in south London and the Phoenix in Oxford, in a deal worth £47.3m.
The deal – which will make Picturehouse's co-founder Lyn Goleby a multimillionaire – unites two very different cinema chains, with Picturehouse's films catering for an older, more high end audience.
The UK cinema market is now dominated by three players – Odeon & UCI, Vue and Cineworld – which control 70% between them. Private equity-owned Vue bought a rival, Apollo, for £20m in May while the financier Guy Hands bought Odeon and UCI in 2004 and merged them to create Britain's biggest operator.
Picturehouse had sales of £30.3m last year and a pretax profit of £2.5m. Bowcock believes the acquisition will create value for Cineworld shareholders. "It's profitable, there is demand for it. The population is getting older and people are spending more money on leisure time."
Cineworld will be able to tap into Picturehouse's purchasing power and vice versa. "For example, Lyn [Goleby] buys alcohol cheaper than we do," said Bowcock.
brow audience while Cineworld's mass-market multiplexes tend to attract 18- to 24-year-olds interested in the latest 3D blockbusters
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