Unilever halts sales process for ice cream unit, plans spinoff, FT says

Unilever (UL) has halted plans to run a sales process for its ice cream unit, which includes brands such as Ben & Jerry’s, Magnum and Wall’s, and instead choosing to focus on an effort to spin off the division in an independent listing, The Financial Times’ Ivan Levingston, Alexandra Heal and Madeleine Speed report. According to people familiar with the matter, while a bidder could still emerge, the EUR 15B ice cream unit’s large size and complicated supply chain are among factors that led private equity firms to cool their interest.