Yum Brands Sells A&W, Long John Silver’s

Yum! Brands Inc. agreed to sell its Long John Silver’s restaurants to LJS Partners LLC and the A&W All-American Food chain to A Great American Brand LLC for undisclosed prices as it focuses on expanding in China.

Definitive agreements have been reached to sell the chains, and the transactions are expected to be completed in the fourth quarter, the companies said today in a statement.

Yum bought Long John Silver’s and A&W for $320 million in 2002, bringing the total to five brands it could offer under the same roof in two-in-one or three-in-one combinations. The company put the chains up for sale in January to focus on boosting sales in China and from its Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and KFC restaurants in the U.S.

Long John Silver’s and A&W are “not really international growth platforms, which is what Yum is pursuing,” Sara Senatore, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein &Co. in New York, said today in a telephone interview. “They didn’t really have even the domestic demand or growth that Yum was looking for when they bought them in the first place.”