Weston Family's $8.9 Billion Deal for Boots, Explained
Wittington Investments has agreed to buy Boots for $8.9bn (£6.74bn). The Guardian reported the agreement on 7 October 2026.
The deal still needs approval from regulators, the public bodies that check large takeovers. Closing is expected in the first quarter of 2027. It is not happening right away.
The sale covers Boots stores in the UK and Ireland. It also includes the opticians business, the No7 beauty brand, and a Boots franchise operation in Thailand. Boots is based in Nottingham. It has 1,800 stores in the UK and 50,000 employees.
Wittington is the holding company, the main firm that holds investments, for the Weston family of Canada. That family controls Loblaws, a large grocery chain in Canada. Investment firm Fairfax is helping fund the purchase. Galen Weston chairs Wittington Investments and is likely to become chair of Boots.
Stefano Pessina and Sycamore Partners will exit as Boots backers under the deal. Pessina will keep two businesses that sit outside the sale. They are Farmacias Benavides, a pharmacy chain in Mexico, and Alliance Healthcare Deutschland, a drug distributor in Germany.
The $8.9bn price is below earlier figures. Walgreens put Boots up for sale in 2022 at up to £10bn, then dropped the plan. A plan to list Boots on the stock market, a float, at about £7bn was dropped in 2024. Pessina had taken Boots private, off the stock market, with backing from KKR in 2007.
In June 2026, Boots was in talks with the Weston family and Australia's Sigma Healthcare for about $10 billion (£7.5 billion). At that time owners planned to drop stock-market listing plans for Boots. Reuters The October terms are lower than that discussed figure.
The buyer already has ties to British retail through family channels. The Canadian side of the Weston family sold the Selfridges department-store chain for £4bn in 2022. The UK side holds a majority stake in Primark through Associated British Foods, which is led by family member George Weston.
The broader context here is what deal watchers will focus on next. The structure is a holding-company purchase with outside financial backing, rather than a straightforward private-equity buyout where an investment fund buys a company with debt. The exclusion of the Mexican and German distribution businesses leaves a perimeter focused on consumer shops, beauty and opticians, plus the Thai franchise. With a pharmacy network this large and regulated, the months between signing and the planned Q1 close allow time for competition and pharmacy-sector reviews, possible conditions on stores, and separation work on supply, IT and shared services. Governance is another question, given the expected link between Wittington leadership and the Boots chair.
