GeoLogistics Corp., Orange County’s largest privately held business, on Friday set aside plans to go public and is instead being sold for $454 million to Kuwait’s PWC Logistics.

Main investor Questor Management Co. said it plans to sell GeoLogistics to PWC.

The Santa Ana-based company, which has yearly sales of $1.6 billion, handles freight-forwarding, customs brokerage, warehousing, supply-chain management and other shipping services for retailers and manufacturers.

Earlier this year, GeoLogistics filed for an initial public offering, looking to raise nearly $175 million. It stood to be one of the larger stock debuts in Orange County this year.

The pending sale comes four years after Questor bought a $67.5 million stake in then-struggling GeoLogistics. The company came close to bankruptcy in 1999 but undertook an out-of-court restructuring to rework $110 million in company debt.

Earlier this year, PWC Logistics acquired New Orleans-based Transoceanic Shipping Co. for an undisclosed amount. Last month, PWC won a $1.5 billion Pentagon contract for services in Kuwait and Iraq.

*Michael Lyster of the Orange County Business Journal contributed to this story.