Mohamed Al Fayed, the former owner of Harrods, is considering a bid for Pinewood Shepperton film studios.
Pinewood, which was home to the fourth instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise and the final Harry Potter film, has already received a 190p-per-share takeover offer from Peel Holdings valuing the company at £88m.
Fayed confirmed in a statement to the City on Thursday that he is "considering making an all-cash offer for Pinewood". "There can be no certainty that an offer will be forthcoming," the statement added.
Fayed, who sold Harrods last year for £1.5bn, previously owned a studio in Egypt and funded the Oscar-winning 1981 film Chariots of Fire, which his late son Dodi executive produced.
Pinewood issued a statement on Wednesday saying that it had "received a further approach from an unconnected third party which also may or may not lead to an offer being made for the company" and later in the day it was reported that this referred to Fayed.
Shares in Pinewood, which is chaired by former ITV executive chairman Michael Grade, rose to a 12-month high of 211p on Thursday morning on news of a potential bidding war for the business.
Peel, the commercial property group which has leased part of Salford's MediaCityUK site to the BBC, is Pinewood's largest shareholder with a stake of 29.78% and could easily block any potential counter-bid from Fayed.
Pinewood's second largest shareholder, Crystal Amber, holds a 28.29% stake and has been critical of the business, calling for Grade to step down as chairman.
Pinewood is home to a range of productions including the next Clash of the Titans film starring Avatar actor Sam Worthington and TV shows including Dancing On Ice, Weakest Link and My Family.
In March the studio announced an initiative to invest a stake of up to 20% in films with production budgets of about £2m in the hope of following the success of Oscar-winner The King's Speech, which cost £9m to make and has grossed more than £150m.
Earlier this year the studio group also announced a franchise deal in the Dominican Republic which it hopes will give it a foothold in the fast-growing Latin American film and TV market.
Other joint venture deals, designed to give the Pinewood brand a global footprint, have resulted in the creation of Pinewood Toronto Studios and Pinewood Malaysia Iskandar Studios, with the latter due to open in 2013.
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