Citigroup Venture Capital Equity Partners, the European buy-out arm of the US banking group, has failed to hit its price target with the sale of Flender Holding, a German-based maker of gears for industrial engines.

When it put the business up for sale using Goldman Sachs as adviser last September, The group had wanted €1.3bn ($1.68bn). Today it agreed the sale to Siemens, Germany's largest engineering company, for €1.2bn.