Apria Healthcare Group to Restructure

Apria Healthcare Group Inc., pressed by investors to sell, is expected to announce today a deal that will raise $172.2 million in new investor money and restructure the board of directors. The transaction, if signed today and approved by shareholders, would end more than six months of speculation over the future of the nation’s largest home health-care company. It also would change the board’s make-up to include representatives from the two investor groups and from two major institutional shareholders that had urged the company to be sold. “I’m very enthusiastic about the company’s future,” said George L. Argyros, 60, the Costa Mesa-based company’s chairman. “I’m looking forward to working with the new board.” Under the proposed agreement, unanimously approved by directors, Apria would recapitalize the company with $242 million from investor funds and an existing bank line of credit. It would use the money to buy back a third of the company’s stock in a tender offer at $14 a share.