Ashridge Business School, one of just seven UK private providers with degree-awarding powers, has announced a potential merger with US business school Hult.

The link with non-profit Hult International Business School could in effect allow the US institution, which has a London campus, to use Ashridge¡¯s degree-awarding powers.

Ashridge said in a statement that the two organisations ¡°will be collaborating closely¡± in the short term, while ¡°in the longer term, the aim is to merge the top management across the two organisations¡±.

Hult is reported to be making a ?50 million investment as part of the deal. However, the statement said that under the ¡°strategic alliance, Ashridge and Hult will remain for the foreseeable future as separate entities, with their own brands, programmes and management¡±.

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Big, for-profit firms such as Pearson, Kaplan and Laureate are known to be interested in acquiring control of UK degree-awarding powers. A number of these are thought to have already shown an interest in Ashridge. An Ashridge spokesman said that there had been ¡°discussions with a number of potential partners. But really it boiled down to Hult, because we are the right fit for one another.¡±

The business school is part of the The Ashridge (Bonar Law Memorial) Trust, which must preserve historic Ashridge House, Hertfordshire (where the business school is located) for the ¡°benefit of the nation¡±.

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The complexities of its charitable trust status may have deterred for-profit buyers, but the broader financial picture may also have been an issue. The trust¡¯s last published set of accounts, for the year ending December 2012, state that it ¡°generated an operating deficit of ?665,000¡±, growing to ?1,388,000 once a pension deficit was taken into account.

The governors ¡°agreed a plan which justifies reasonable expectation that the trust will return to surplus in 2013¡±, the accounts add.

The performance of the Ashridge Pension Scheme meant the trust¡¯s pension deficit increased from ?23.8 million to ?29.7 million in 2012, the accounts state. Group net assets fell from ?6,957,000 to ?608,000 in 2012, the accounts also show.

john.morgan@tsleducation.com