Munich — Water­land Private Equity sells its stake in A‑ROSA River Crui­ses Group to Duke Street. The British company, based in London, toge­ther with the manage­ment, is acqui­ring all shares in the market leader for premium river crui­ses on Europe’s water­ways. Water­land Private Equity was advi­sed by Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP.

“We are plea­sed to have found a new inves­tor in Duke Street who will conti­nue to drive the growth of the A‑ROSA River Crui­ses Group,” said Jörg Drei­sow, Mana­ging Part­ner of Water­land. The inde­pen­dent private equity invest­ment company acqui­red a majo­rity stake in the leading German river cruise opera­tor in 2009 and has since made a signi­fi­cant contri­bu­tion to the company’s growth into the most successful river cruise opera­tor in the German source market. Jörg Eich­ler, CEO of A‑ROSA: “Thanks to the part­ner­ship with Water­land, we have conti­nuously streng­the­ned our leading posi­tion in Europe over the past years.” Since 2009, the premium provi­der of river crui­ses has expan­ded its fleet from six to eleven cruise ships and added the Rhine and the Seine as crui­sing areas. — The tran­sac­tion is subject to appr­oval by the anti­trust autho­ri­ties. Confi­den­tia­lity was agreed between the parties regar­ding the finan­cial details of the transaction.

About Water­land Private Equity
Water­land is an inde­pen­dent private equity invest­ment firm that helps entre­pre­neurs achieve their growth objec­ti­ves. With exten­sive finan­cial resour­ces and the dedi­ca­ted profes­sio­nals, Water­land crea­tes the basis for port­fo­lio compa­nies to grow faster both orga­ni­cally and through acqui­si­ti­ons. Water­land acts as an active share­hol­der and plays a key role for the compa­nies in the port­fo­lio in their stra­te­gic and opera­tio­nal deve­lo­p­ment, growth and perfor­mance. With a team expe­ri­en­ced in the field of entre­pre­neu­rial invest­ment, Water­land aims to help ambi­tious entre­pre­neurs achieve a stable market posi­tion in today’s incre­asingly compe­ti­tive world. To date, Water­land has inves­ted in over 400 companies.

Advi­sor Water­land Private Equity: Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP
The Will­kie team led by Mario Schmidt and Dr. Stefan Jörgens (both Corpo­rate, Frank­furt) and consis­ted of part­ners Dr. Axel Wahl (Corpo­rate, Frank­furt), Dr. Patrick Meiisel, Dr. Bettina Bokeloh (both Tax, Frank­furt), Jan Wilms, Dr. Jasmin Dett­mar (both Finance, Frank­furt), Dr. Chris­tian Rolf (Labor Law, Frank­furt) and asso­cia­tes Dr. Stefan Bührle, Adrian Deng­ler, Erik Göretz­leh­ner, Andreas Knöd­ler and Kars­ten Silber­na­gel (all Corpo­rate, Frankfurt).

Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm of more than 650 lawy­ers with offices in New York, Washing­ton, Hous­ton, Paris, London, Milan, Rome, Frank­furt am Main and Brussels.