Home shopping group Ideal Shopping Direct is set to be sold to private equity firm Inflexion and its management in a £78.3m deal.

The recommended cash offer for the company values the AIM-listed retailer at 220p a share. Following completion of the deal the company will be owned by funds advised or managed by Inflexion plus directors Mike Hancox and Ian Jebson, and former Halfords boss David Hamid, who will be chairman.

The independent directors, who haver been advised by Rothschild, plan to recommend the offer, which represents a premiuim of 46.2p to the share price on 9 July 2010, the last working day before the company said it was considering a sale.

Ideal Shopping operates via four TV shopping channels, with the flagship being Ideal World, and via the internet, where it operates five websites.