(Bloomberg) -- Carlyle Group Inc. is nearing an agreement to acquire Siemens AG’s mechanical drive unit for about 2 billion euros ($2.4 billion), according to people familiar with the matter.

The U.S. buyout firm and German engineer are finalizing terms of the deal, which could be announced as early as this week, the people said, who asked not to be identified because discussions are private.

Carlyle outbid Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management Inc. in the end, the people said. Talks could still be delayed or fall apart. Representatives for Siemens, Carlyle and Brookfield declined to comment.

Siemens had been exploring a sale as well as a spinoff of the Flender business, which it bought from Citigroup Inc. in 2005. The unit makes gears and transmissions used in everything from cement production and shipbuilding to beermaking and offshore oil extraction.

A disposal of Bocholt, Germany-based Flender would mark one of the final acts by Siemens’s Chief Executive Officer Joe Kaeser to turn the industrial manufacturing giant into a more manageable entity for his successor Roland Busch. Last month, the company listed Siemens Energy AG, whose technology is behind roughly one-sixth of the world’s electricity.

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