UK's Ascential to sell digital commerce, product design units in $1.70 billion deal

(Reuters) -Information and analytics firm Ascential said on Monday it would sell its digital commerce and consumer research units for a combined enterprise value of 1.4 billion pounds ($1.7 billion) as the UK-based company focuses on its events business.

Shares in the FTSE 250 company soared about 34% to a more than 15-month high of 289.6 pence in early trade.

London-listed Ascential said it intended to distribute about 850 million pounds to shareholders following the completion of the transactions.

The digital commerce business would be sold to U.S.-listed Omnicom Group for an enterprise value of $900 million, it said.

The consumer research unit - WGSN - would be sold to Wind UK Bidco 3 Ltd, a company established by funds advised by private equity firm Apax Partners, for an enterprise value of up to 700 million pounds.

Ascential said its CEO Duncan Painter would join Omnicom to take on a new role as chief of Flywheel Digital, a newly formed part of the U.S.-based company which will operate the digital commerce business.

Ascential had earlier said that Philip Thomas, currently CEO of its intelligence and events business, would be appointed as the group's next chief executive.

The WGSN divestment is part of a break-up plan announced in January which originally included separation and a U.S. listing of its digital commerce assets.

Ascential also noted that media management firm Hudson MX had started the sale of its Hudson business, in which Ascential holds a 36.5% stake. Omnicom has confirmed its participation in that sale process, Ascential said in a statement, without elaborating.

($1 = 0.8245 pounds)

(Reporting by Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich and Mark Potter and Jason Neely)