US buy-out firms Bain Capital and The Blackstone Group are backing Haier Group, China's largest refrigerator maker, on a $1.28bn (€1bn) bid for Maytag, the US domestic appliance manufacturer, topping a bid backed by rival private equity firms.

Maytag said in a statement yesterday that it had received a preliminary bid of $16 a share from the consortium, higher than the $14-a-share offer from a rival consortium of Ripplewood, a US buy-out group, Goldman Sachs Capital Partners, the private equity arm of the US bank, and J Rothschild Group.