Blackstone Group LP’s lending arm said bankrupt Gibson Brands Inc. has failed to properly market its assets, thereby favoring its proposed sale to senior secured bondholders, The Wall Street Journal reported. The investment firm added that it is willing to provide additional financing to give the guitar maker more time to consider alternative offers. Blackstone’s GSO Capital Partners LP is owed $77 million on a secured term loan the musical-instruments company had on its books as it headed into bankruptcy. The firm echoed earlier calls by unsecured creditors, including electronics company Koninklijke Philips NV, for Gibson to make a bigger push to find potential new buyers. GSO said it “would even be willing to help fund that process by providing” financing for Gibson during the bankruptcy, as well as when it wraps up chapter 11 proceedings, “to further stimulate bidding in an open-sale process,” according to a filing in bankruptcy court. Gibson filed for bankruptcy in May with a reorganization plan that would allow senior secured bondholders led by KKR & Co. to convert their debt into equity in the business, which was founded in 1894. GSO said there are other interested bidders, both strategic and financial, who might be willing to buy Gibson at a price greater than the recent valuation of the Nashville, Tenn.-based owner of such guitar brands as Les Paul and Flying V. Some potential bidders haven’t been contacted by Gibson about buying its assets, GSO said. Earlier efforts to find buyers have been “half hearted” and there has been a “failure to properly market” the company, GSO said.
