First Group acquired its American businesses, including the school buses, in a £1.9 billion deal in 2008 FIRST GROUPFirst Group has capitulated to investor demands and drawn up proposals to break itself up. The passenger transport group headquartered in Scotland and listed in London is to turn itself into an American business and concentrate on its yellow school bus and university and airport shuttles in the US. It will sell off its UK bus operations and Greyhound, its chronically underperforming intercity coach business in the US. It also strongly signalled that it would run down its rail interests in the UK, blaming the current toxic environment with the Department for Transport over train franchising. First Group operates two of Britain’s most important train franchises: GWR, running between London Paddington and Wales and the West Country; and South Western Railway, into and out of…

Source: The Times May 30, 2019 08:03 UTC