Author: Tatjana Anderer

Egels­bach / Munich — Funds advi­sed by Bregal Unter­neh­mer kapi­tal (“Bregal Entre­pre­neu­rial Capi­tal”) acquire a majo­rity stake in Murnauer Marken­ver­trieb GmbH, based in Egels­bach near Frank­furt am Main. The company deve­lops and distri­bu­tes medi­cal, natur­opa­thic and cosme­tic products, dental care prepa­ra­ti­ons and nutri­tio­nal or dietary supple­ments. The seller of the shares is Colo­gne-based FETTE Pharma AG, a family holding company headed by Tamar Ving­ron and her brot­her Henry Dawi­do­wicz, which will conti­nue to hold a signi­fi­cant stake in the company. Mr. Dawi­do­wicz will conti­nue to manage Murnauer’s busi­ness as CEO — along­side Ms. Henrike Schick as CMO and Mr. Tilo Beer­baum as COO.

Successful with brands such as PERLWEISS, Salt­house and Dermasel
FETTEPharma has been successfully repre­sen­ted on the German market for over 40 years and has specia­li­zed in products using the unique active ingre­di­ent Dead Sea salt for thera­peu­tic and cosme­tic appli­ca­ti­ons since 1976 — inclu­ding brands such as “Derma­Sel” and “Salt­house”. Foun­ded around 30 years ago, Murnauer Marken­ver­trieb GmbH has been part of the FETTE Pharma Group since 2012 and distri­bu­tes its nume­rous medi­cal, cosme­tic and well­ness products for phar­macies, food retail­ers and drugs­to­res. In addi­tion, the company is successful with well-known brands such as “PERLWEISS” (teeth whitening products), “Murnauer’s Bach flowers” and “Früh­mes­ner” (natu­ral medi­cine and natu­ral cosme­tics lines) as well as “Murnauer’s crys­tal deodo­rant” in the afore­men­tio­ned sales chan­nels. The steadily growing product port­fo­lio with its own and licen­sed brands has been among the leaders in the respec­tive product segments for deca­des and focu­ses on premium quality as well as valuable and well-tole­ra­ted ingredients.

Focus on growth in highly attrac­tive market environment
“I am plea­sed to have found the ideal part­ner in Bregal, which will support Murnauer’s successful course not only with capi­tal strength, but also with the neces­sary sensi­ti­vity to our tradi­tion and corpo­rate values, as well as with profound know-how and networ­king in the health­care market,” explains Henry Dawi­do­wicz, Mana­ging Part­ner of Murnauer. Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal is itself part of a family busi­ness built up over gene­ra­ti­ons and accom­pa­nies medium-sized compa­nies in Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land of various indus­tries in their deve­lo­p­ment within the frame­work of long-term invest­ments. Toge­ther with the manage­ment and the employees, Bregal now wants to conti­nue the inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion of Murnauer, open up new markets and expand the product port­fo­lio. Acqui­si­ti­ons of suita­ble brands are also opti­ons in the new stra­tegy. “The trend towards healthy, sustainable nutri­tion, natu­ral cosme­tics as well as alter­na­tive medi­cine conti­nues unstopp­ably — in this envi­ron­ment, a supplier as excel­lently posi­tio­ned in the market and as renow­ned as Murnauer has the best oppor­tu­ni­ties for further deve­lo­p­ment,” says Florian Schick, Chair­man of the Manage­ment Board at Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal. “We are very exci­ted to lead Murnauer into the next phase of growth with Henry Dawi­do­wicz and the entire team.”

The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the sale price or other details of the tran­sac­tion. The tran­sac­tion is still subject to the usual regu­la­tory approval.

About Bregal Entre­pre­neu­rial Capital
Bregal entre­pre­neu­rial capi­tal is part of a family busi­ness built over gene­ra­ti­ons. The focus is on invest­ments that are open to long-term commit­ments and inde­pen­dent of deve­lo­p­ments on the finan­cial markets. Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal iden­ti­fies compa­nies that have strong manage­ment teams and are conside­red market leaders or “hidden cham­pi­ons” in their respec­tive segments. Thanks to flexi­ble finan­cing and tran­sac­tion struc­tures, both mino­rity and majo­rity share­hol­dings are targe­ted. In doing so, Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal is able to sensi­tively and result-orien­tedly design even complex indus­trial spin-offs, manage­ment buy-outs or succes­sion situa­tions. Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal stri­ves to support compa­nies in incre­asing their sales and profi­ta­bi­lity in a sustainable manner and accom­pa­nies them with capi­tal, long-stan­ding finan­cing exper­tise and a broad network of entre­pre­neurs and indus­try experts. www.bregal.de

About Murnauer Markenvertrieb
Murnauer Marken­ver­trieb GmbH, head­quar­te­red in Egels­bach near Frankfurt/Main, has been deve­lo­ping and marke­ting medi­cal and cosme­tic products, dental care prepa­ra­ti­ons, natur­opa­thic special­ties, and food and nutri­tio­nal supple­ments for 25 years. The steadily growing product port­fo­lio with own and licen­sed brands has been among the leaders in the respec­tive product segments for deca­des. The company relies on the active prin­ci­ples of nature in combi­na­tion with modern know-how. www.murnauers.de

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) is inves­t­ing in Karl Eugen Fischer GmbH (KEF), the world’s leading company for the deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­ture of cutting systems for the tire indus­try. DBAG Fund VII, advi­sed by Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, will acquire the majo­rity of the shares as part of a manage­ment buyout; they will be sold by funds advi­sed by Equis­tone Part­ners Europe. DBAG will initi­ally invest up to €23.5 million for its co-invest­ment. In the target struc­ture, they will in future hold around 20 percent of the shares in the company. Further shares besi­des DBAG Fund VII will be held by the company’s manage­ment. The closing of the purchase agree­ment signed yester­day is sche­du­led for the end of this month. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

The latest acqui­si­tion marks DBAG Fund VII’s fourth MBO struc­tu­red since the fund’s invest­ment period began in Decem­ber 2016. With a volume of just over one billion euros, it is the largest private equity fund initia­ted and advi­sed by a German private equity company. After four tran­sac­tions, around one third of the invest­ment commit­ments are now committed.

Tire manu­fac­tu­r­ers use the machi­nes produ­ced by KEF (www.kefischer.de) to assem­ble mainly rubber-coated steel wire and fabric layers (so-called calen­de­red cord mate­rial) for tire carcas­ses and tire belts. These layers form the support­ing struc­ture of the tire and give it shape and driving stabi­lity. They are precis­ely cut with equip­ment from KEF machi­nes. Since the deve­lo­p­ment of the first steel cord cutting line in 1970, a “Fischer line” has become a gene­ric name: Nine of the ten most successful tire manu­fac­tu­r­ers in the world now rely on the company’s machi­nes, whose global market share is around 70 percent. Produc­tion takes place at the company’s head­quar­ters in Burg­kunst­adt (Upper Fran­co­nia), where more than 500 of the total work­force of 545 are employed. There is a sales and service company in both the USA and China. In 2017, 83 million euros were turned over.

Cutting systems are crucial for a smooth produc­tion flow. KEF machi­nes are tech­no­lo­gi­cal leaders in this respect: They are charac­te­ri­zed, for exam­ple, by high precis­ion and low mate­rial losses, both important success factors. With a high level of verti­cal inte­gra­tion, KEF ensu­res that the machi­nes adapted to the respec­tive custo­mer requi­re­ments can be deli­vered in the desi­red quality and on time. The company has been working with its custo­mers for deca­des in the deve­lo­p­ment of the machi­nes and is a prefer­red supplier for quite a few tire manu­fac­tu­r­ers. Based on its outstan­ding tech­no­lo­gi­cal posi­tion, KEF is expec­ted to bene­fit from the incre­asing demand for tires and thus for corre­spon­ding produc­tion faci­li­ties. To this end, invest­ments will be made in expan­ding capa­ci­ties in the coming year, for exam­ple with the cons­truc­tion of a further assem­bly shop in Burgkunstadt.

Mecha­ni­cal and plant engi­nee­ring and auto­mo­tive suppli­ers are two of Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG’s four core sectors; in the past ten years alone, DBAG has inves­ted in ten compa­nies from these two sectors. “With our expe­ri­ence and focus on invest­ments in medium-sized compa­nies, we are the ideal part­ner for the company,” commen­ted Dr. Rolf Schef­fels, member of the DBAG Manage­ment Board, on the tran­sac­tion. “We see further poten­tial for Karl Eugen Fischer in view of the tire manu­fac­tu­r­ers’ invest­ment plans and market deve­lo­p­ments,” Dr. Schef­fels added.

“Our company has bene­fi­ted from the support of private equity funds since the foun­ding family sold the company more than ten years ago — they have supported our busi­ness,” explains Simone Thies. The commer­cial direc­tor points to the average annual growth of five percent in sales and the number of employees since 2005. He added: “We are sure that with DBAG we will also be able to exploit the oppor­tu­ni­ties that lie not only in market growth, but also in further expan­sion of the service busi­ness in view of the large number of turbi­nes installed.”

Advi­sor DBAG: Gleiss Lutz
DBAG’s compli­ance advice was provi­ded by a Gleiss Lutz team led by Dr. Eike Bicker (lead, part­ner) and inclu­ding the follo­wing lawy­ers: Marina Stoklasa, Domingo de Prada, Dr. Chris­toph Skou­pil (all compli­ance, Frank­furt), Dr. Moritz Holm-Hadulla (part­ner), Dr. Domi­nik Braun, Dr. Vanessa Gehle (all anti­trust, Stuttgart).
At Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, Mr. Florian Döring (Gene­ral Coun­sel) advi­sed on the acqui­si­tion and coor­di­na­ted the process.

Gleiss Lutz regu­larly advi­ses DBAG and other inter­na­tio­nal and natio­nal private equity inves­tors on invest­ments in promi­sing compa­nies, inclu­ding in the area of venture capital.

About DBAG
Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG is a listed private equity company. We initiate closed-end private equity funds: DBAG funds enable insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors to invest in the equity or equity-like instru­ments of unlis­ted compa­nies. DBAG advi­ses and mana­ges these funds. In other words, it seeks out, exami­nes and struc­tures oppor­tu­ni­ties for parti­ci­pa­tion. We nego­tiate invest­ment agree­ments, accom­pany the port­fo­lio compa­nies during the invest­ment period and design the dive­st­ment process. We co-invest along­side these DBAG funds with funds from our own balance sheet. A DBAG share thus provi­des access to a port­fo­lio of unlis­ted compa­nies and, at the same time, to a successful fund advi­sory business.

Our focus is on medium-sized compa­nies. Their busi­ness models and markets are what we have been deal­ing with for decades.