A contest to buy the maker of Steinway & Sons pianos is ending in a diminuendo.
The private equity firm Kohlberg & Company, which offered last month to buy Steinway Musical Instruments, said on Tuesday that it would not seek to raise its bid in the face of a rival offer. That puts Steinway in a position to complete a buyout deal with the rival bidder, which offered this week to buy the company for $38 a share, or about $475 million.
The rival bidder, which has not been publicly identified, is the hedge fund Paulson & Company, in a rare foray into private equity, according to a person briefed on the matter who was not authorized to speak publicly.
Kohlberg, which originally bid $35 a share, or $438 million, for Steinway, told the company that it waived its right to negotiate with the board about possibly increasing its bid, the private equity firm said on Tuesday in a regulatory filing.
Steinway’s stock price fell 3.33 percent on Tuesday to close at $38.27 a share. The slight premium above the price of the Paulson bid suggests investors may be expecting Steinway to receive additional offers.
A 45-day “go-shop†period, during which Steinway can invite rival bids, is ending on Wednesday.
Representatives for Steinway and Paulson declined to comment.
The company, which was founded in 1853 by Henry Engelhard Steinway and his three sons, makes pianos, horns and other instruments that are used by professionals and amateurs alike. It based in Waltham, Mass., and has factories in Hamburg, Germany and Astoria, Queens.
For piano aficionados in New York, this summer has been tinged with melancholy. Steinway closed on the sale of a well-known showroom on West 57th Street in Manhattan just days before announcing its intention to sell itself to a private equity firm.
A going-private transaction would give Steinway its fifth set of owners. The Steinway family sold the company in 1972 to CBS, and it changed hands several times thereafter before going public in 1996.
Fortunately for piano lovers, Steinway’s craftsmen have had relative autonomy over the years, said Richard K. Lieberman, a historian at LaGuardia Community College who wrote a book on Steinway.
“The owners have a commitment to making money. The commitment to quality, the commitment to the piano, is in the factory. It’s with the foremen, it’s with the workers,†Mr. Lieberman said. “I’m pretty comfortable, as a historian of Steinway, to say I trust those workers.â€
