Greyhound, the trans-American bus company, is set to fall into British hands as FirstGroup prepares a £1.5 billion takeover.

The Aberdeen-based rail and bus operator is understood to be in talks to buy Laidlaw of the United States. The deal could be concluded as early as today, ahead of Laidlaw’s annual meeting in Chicago, and would give FirstGroup a dominant position in the US school bus market.

FirstGroup already owns First Student, the second largest school bus group, which it bought in 2000 for £540 million. Laidlaw is the largest operator of school buses in America and also owns Greyhound, the long-distance coach service.

By combining the two companies, FirstGroup would control more than 30 per cent of the school bus market.

The deal is expected to be priced at between $35 and $37 a share, valuing Laidlaw at $2.78 billion to $2.93 billion (£1.40 billion to £1.48 billion), plus about $440 million in debt.

Analysts have given warning that FirstGroup might be forced into a rights issue to pay for the deal. Another threat to the deal’s success comes from trades unions, which are wary of what they have called FirstGroup’s “troubling labour and service record”.

Laidlaw has struggled in recent years. It entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2001 and underwent significant restructuring. In the year to the end of August 2006, the company reported net income of just $1.25 million on revenues of $3.13 billion.

Greyhound accounted for about a third of that revenue, having scaled back its operations since its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s.

Laidlaw started business in 1924 as a trucking firm.

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