Soho House plugs funding gap to secure take-private deal

Soho House has secured the financing required to keep its £2b take-private deal on track after major investor MCR Hotels pulled out of a $200m (£149m) funding commitment last week.

The London-based members’ club partially covered the shortfall by entering into a $50m (£37m) equity commitment with Morse Ventures, owned by Tyler Morse, the chairman and chief executive of MCR Hotels affiliate MCR Investors.

MCR Hotels itself has also committed a further $50m (£37m), taking its financing to $100m (£75m) – half of its original $200m figure.

To raise the rest of the funding, Soho House’s debt financiers Apollo Capital Management and Goldman Sachs (GS Principal Investors) agreed to increase the members’ club’s unsecured notes facility from $150m (£112m) to $220m (£164m). Apollo also agreed to reduce its existing $50m equity commitment to $30m (£22m).

Completing the financing measures, Soho House amended its existing rollover and support agreements with a number of shareholders, including Ivy Collection boss Richard Caring, who agreed to roll over additional shares rather than cash them out at the deal’s $9 (£7) a share price. This reduced the funds required to close the transaction by approximately $50m.

Soho House first announced its intention to move back to private ownership in August 2025 after four years on the New York Stock Exchange. It was to enter into a multibillion-pound deal with a group of investors, including MCR Hotels and actor Ashton Kutcher.

MCR Hotels, the third-largest hotel owner-operator in the US and the owner of London’s BT Tower, had agreed to pay $9 a share to acquire Soho House, which the company said represented an 83% premium to the price before the expression of investor interest in December 2024.

However, in a notice on 8 January, MCR Hotels disclosed to existing shareholders Yucaipa, founded by Soho House executive chairman Ron Burkle, that it was unable to fund its commitment by the expected closing date.

Subject to the execution of this latest funding round, Soho House now expects the deal to be closed by late January.

Soho House was founded by Nick Jones in London in 1995 to act as a hub for people working in the creative industries. It now runs 50 clubs globally.

MCR operates 150 hotels across the US, including the TWA hotel at John F Kennedy International Airport in New York.