News-Kategorie: Private Equity

Brussels, Febru­ary 9, 2018 — svt Holding GmbH (“svt”), a port­fo­lio company of Ergon Capi­tal Part­ners III S.A. (“Ergon”), joins forces with the Rolf Kuhn Group, consis­ting of Rolf Kuhn GmbH and an indi­rect 90% inte­rest in Rolf Kuhn Brand­schutz GmbH, Austria, as well as Flamro Brand­schutz-Systeme GmbH, Prüf- und Tech­nik­zen­trum Brand­schutz GmbH and Kuhn Service GmbH (the “Rolf Kuhn Group”).

The Rolf Kuhn Group, foun­ded in 1976, is a leading German manu­fac­tu­rer of fire protec­tion mate­ri­als for the proces­sing indus­try, espe­ci­ally the door indus­try, for complete systems in buil­ding services as well as fire protec­tion access­ories for the glazing indus­try. Flamro, a leading manu­fac­tu­rer of bulk­head systems, has also been part of the Rolf Kuhn Group since 2012, as has Brand­che­mie since 2016.

The merger of the Rolf Kuhn Group and svt crea­tes a leading Euro­pean supplier of fire protec­tion products with the largest and most compre­hen­sive product port­fo­lio. Toge­ther, the group employs over 600 people and gene­ra­tes sales of appro­xi­m­ately €150 million in over 60 count­ries. The Group has an exten­sive port­fo­lio of over 400 natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal approvals

Mr. Jürgen Wied, as the respon­si­ble opera­tio­nal mana­ging direc­tor in the compa­nies of the Rolf Kuhn Group, looks back on 23 years of expe­ri­ence with the Rolf Kuhn Group and will conti­nue to hold the opera­tio­nal respon­si­bi­lity. Mr. Harald Kuhn, as previous share­hol­der of the Rolf Kuhn Group, will contri­bute his valuable expe­ri­ence to the joint group within the frame­work of an advi­sory board posi­tion. Mr. Stef­fen Gerdau will lead the Group as CEO.

“After long and inten­sive deli­be­ra­ti­ons on the solu­tion for the succes­sion of the Rolf Kuhn Group, I am convin­ced to have found the ideal part­ner in svt. The acti­vi­ties of the two compa­nies, which have grown conti­nuously in recent years, comple­ment each other perfectly,” commen­ted Harald Kuhn. Stef­fen Gerdau said, “I am looking forward to working with the employees of the Rolf Kuhn Group. svt and Rolf Kuhn comple­ment each other ideally and I am convin­ced that toge­ther the new group will serve its custo­mers even more successfully in the natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal markets.”

Wolf­gang de Limburg, Mana­ging Part­ner of Ergon, added: “We are very plea­sed to accom­pany svt and Rolf Kuhn in this important stra­te­gic step. We are convin­ced of the indus­trial logic of the merger and thank both manage­ment teams and Mr. Kuhn for their confi­dence in Ergon as a new share­hol­der.” Nils Lüssem, Part­ner at Ergon in Germany added: “The combi­ned group forms a leading Euro­pean market player in the attrac­tive niche market of products for preven­tive passive fire protec­tion. We are plea­sed to be able to support the combi­ned group in the future.” — The merger is subject to the suspen­sive condi­tion of anti­trust approval.

About Rolf Kuhn Group
The Rolf Kuhn Group was foun­ded in 1976 and has its head­quar­ters in Ernd­te­brück in North Rhine-West­pha­lia. The Rolf Kuhn Group is a leading manu­fac­tu­rer of fire protec­tion mate­ri­als for the proces­sing indus­try, espe­ci­ally the door indus­try, for complete systems in buil­ding tech­no­logy as well as fire protec­tion access­ories for the glazing indus­try. With ~160 employees, the group distri­bu­tes its products in Germany and inter­na­tio­nally in ~60 count­ries in Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America.
www.kuhn-brandschutz.com and www.flamro.de

About svt
svt was foun­ded in 1969 and has its head­quar­ters in Seeve­tal near Hamburg. svt is a leading supplier of products for preven­tive passive fire protec­tion and their instal­la­tion. In addi­tion, svt is a full-service provi­der for damage resto­ra­tion services follo­wing fire, water and natu­ral hazards damage, as well as for the removal of pollut­ants. With ~450 employees, svt serves its custo­mers through its nati­on­wide network of 32 offices and through its subsi­dia­ries in Singa­pore, Dubai and Poland. www.svt.de

About Ergon Capi­tal Part­ners III S.A.
Ergon Capi­tal Part­ners III S.A. (“Ergon”) is a leading middle market inves­tor with ~€500 million of capi­tal under manage­ment, predo­mi­nantly finan­ced by the family holding company Groupe Bruxel­les Lambert (“GBL”). Ergon is a disci­pli­ned and discreet share­hol­der with “friendly” capi­tal and a focus on profes­sio­na­liza­tion, opera­tio­nal value enhance­ment and growth. Ergon is targe­ting equity invest­ments of €25 million to €75 million in leading compa­nies with sustainable compe­ti­tive posi­ti­ons in Bene­lux, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Switz­er­land. Ergon is advi­sed by Ergon Capi­tal Advi­sors with offices in Brussels, Madrid, Milan, Munich and Paris.
Since its foun­da­tion in 2005, Ergon has inves­ted in 18 port­fo­lio compa­nies (5 in Bene­lux, 3 in Germany, 2 in France, 7 in Italy and 1 in Spain) as well as 31 addi­tio­nal acqui­si­ti­ons with a volume of € 3.0 billion.

Munich — Private equity inves­tor EQT sells CBR Fashion Group to Alteri Inves­tors. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the sales price.

With its Street One and Cecil brands, the CBR Fashion Group is one of the five largest women’s fashion manu­fac­tu­r­ers in Germany. The group employs over 1,200 people and supplies more than 8,300 sales outlets in 19 Euro­pean count­ries. In Novem­ber 2017, CBR Fashion Group issued a bond in the amount of 450 million euros through. In the past fiscal year to June 2017, CBR had gene­ra­ted sales of around 579 million euros, with earnings before inte­rest, taxes, depre­cia­tion and amor­tiza­tion (Ebitda) of around 100 million euros, accor­ding to the company. Private equity inves­tor EQT had owned CBR Fashion Group since 2007.

The British invest­ment company Alteri Inves­tors was foun­ded in 2014, the company invests in Euro­pean retail compa­nies. The joint venture part­ner is the invest­ment mana­ger Apollo Global Management.

P+P Pöllath + Part­ners advi­sedEQT on the manage­ment invest­ment in the tran­sac­tion with the follo­wing Munich team:
Dr. Bene­dikt Hohaus (Part­ner, M&A/PE, MPP)
Dr. Tim Kauf­hold (Coun­sel, M&A/PE, MPP)
Dr. Sebas­tian Sumal­vico (Asso­ciate, M&A/PE, MPP)
Matthias Ober­bauer (Asso­ciate, M&A/PE, MPP)

P+P Pöllath + Part­ner regu­larly advi­ses EQT on manage­ment invest­ments, for exam­ple on the sale of SAG to SPIE or the sale of BSN medi­cal to the Swedish SCA.

Berlin — Through its tech­no­logy fund Vision Fund, Japa­nese tele­coms group Soft­Bank is inves­t­ing EUR 460 million in the Berlin-based used car plat­form “Wir kaufen Dein Auto” of Auto1 Group GmbH. Appro­xi­m­ately half of the invest­ment will flow directly into the company in exch­ange for newly issued shares. P+P advi­sed the exis­ting inves­tor DN Capi­tal on the new finan­cing round and on various share sales in connec­tion with the current finan­cing round.

With a valua­tion of EUR 2.9 billion, Auto1, whose best-known current offe­ring is the Wirkaufendeinauto.de plat­form, is now one of the most valuable tech start­ups in Europe. — Auto1 was foun­ded in 2012 by Hakan Koç and Chris­tian Berter­mann. Accor­ding to its own figu­res, the online market­place for the purchase and sale of used cars sold more than 300,000 vehic­les in 2016. Sales in 2016 amoun­ted to 1.5 billion euros.

The startup has recei­ved nearly EUR 900 million in funding so far from inves­tors inclu­ding DN Capi­tal, JP Morgan and Gold­man Sachs. In the last finan­cing round in May 2017, EUR 360 million was raised from VC Target Global and the Scot­tish invest­ment company Bail­lie Gifford, among others.

Soft­Bank had most recently inves­ted in tech­no­logy compa­nies such as the messen­ger service Slack via its $90 billion Vision Fund.

Advi­sor to the previous inves­tor DN Capi­tal: P+P Pöllath + Partners
Chris­tian Tönies, LL.M. Eur. (Part­ner, Lead, VC, Munich/Berlin)
Dr. Sebas­tian Gerlin­ger, LL.M. (Senior Asso­ciate, VC, Munich/Berlin)

Lotte — Silver­fleet Capi­tal acqui­res 7days Group, a leading specia­list in fashionable work­wear for medi­cal profes­si­ons. Silver­fleet Capi­tal, the Euro­pean private equity firm specia­li­zing in “buy to build”, has signed a binding agree­ment with the invest­ment company Odewald KMU and the company’s foun­ders Marc Staper­feld and Ulrich Dölken to acquire a majo­rity stake. The two foun­ders conti­nue to be invol­ved in the company through a reverse share­hol­ding. The tran­sac­tion is still subject to regu­la­tory appr­oval; the parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

7days designs, manu­fac­tures and distri­bu­tes profes­sio­nal clot­hing for the health­care sector. The exten­sive product range includes, among other things, doctors’ and lab coats, tops such as polo shirts and sweat­shirts, pants, as well as shoes and access­ories; a parti­cu­lar focus is on the range for doctors’ and dentists’ surge­ries. The company, foun­ded in 1999 and head­quar­te­red in Lotte near Osna­brück, is active not only in Germany but also in Austria, Switz­er­land, France, Belgium and the Nether­lands. The design studio and purcha­sing depart­ment are also loca­ted in Lotte; the produc­tion site is in Tangier, Morocco. As a verti­cally inte­gra­ted supplier, 7days sells its artic­les both online via webshop and news­let­ter and tradi­tio­nally via cata­log. The company accepts orders online, by phone or by fax.

Silver­fleet Capital’s commit­ment is inten­ded to support 7days in expan­ding its market posi­tion in Germany and the other exis­ting markets, as well as in deve­lo­ping other regi­ons such as Scan­di­na­via and addi­tio­nal custo­mer segments. The acqui­si­tion is Silver­fleet Capital’s second German invest­ment in the second half of 2017 and the seventh invest­ment from its current fund.

“7days has a strong brand and a loyal core custo­mer base. The company opera­tes as a leader in its indus­try in a specia­li­zed, fast-growing and inter­na­tio­nal market — a text­book invest­ment for us,” says Joachim Braun, Part­ner at Silver­fleet Capi­tal and respon­si­ble for invest­ment acti­vi­ties in Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land. “We look forward to working with the expe­ri­en­ced manage­ment team led by Marc Staper­feld to further deve­lop the company.”

Marc Staper­feld, foun­der and CEO of 7days adds: “It makes me proud that 7days has grown signi­fi­cantly since its incep­tion. I am deligh­ted that Silver­fleet Capi­tal is now accom­pany­ing us into the next phase of deve­lo­p­ment. With its pan-Euro­pean presence and exten­sive invest­ment expe­ri­ence, Silver­fleet Capi­tal is the ideal part­ner for our further growth plans. The team shares our vision and the values that drive the company’s success.”

The Silver­fleet team entrus­ted with the tran­sac­tion includes Munich-based invest­ment experts Joachim Braun, Benja­min Hubner, Jenni­fer Regehr and Jan Kux. Silver­fleet was advi­sed by Alva­rez & Marsal (Finan­cial), goetz­part­ners(Commer­cial), Noerr (Legal, Corpo­rate), Shear­man & Ster­ling (Legal, Banking), Deloitte (Tax), Herter & Co. (Debt Advi­sory), ecce­le­rate (Digital/Online), KPMG (M&A) and Marsh (Insu­rance).

About 7days Group
Foun­ded in 1999, the 7days Group is a fully inte­gra­ted B2B mail order company of medi­cal and nursing work­wear with a fashion focus. The product range includes, among others, jackets, pants, polo shirts, smocks, shoes and access­ories; indi­vi­dual embro­idery and third-party brands round off the product range. Key success factors are the fashion orien­ta­tion, the high quality stan­dards and the compre­hen­sive custo­mer service.

Advi­sors to Odewald KMU: Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek
Dr. Pär Johans­son (lead), Dr. Phil­ipp Jansen, Dr. Chris­toph Schork, LL.M. (all Private Equity, Corporate/M&A), all Cologne
Fabian G. Gaffron (Tax Law), Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (Anti­trust Law), all Hamburg

Munich / Wallau / Burg­bern­heim — The fund Perusa Part­ners Fund II L.P., advi­sed by the inde­pen­dent Perusa GmbH, toge­ther with other insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors, acqui­red the Swiss Secura Indus­trie­be­tei­li­gun­gen AG inclu­ding the MÜPRO Group and UBB GmbH as of Janu­ary 23, 2018.

MÜPRO is a leading global provi­der of fastening, noise control and fire protec­tion solu­ti­ons with conso­li­da­ted sales of around EUR 95 million. Its fastening solu­ti­ons are used in buil­dings, commer­cial proper­ties and indus­trial plants, espe­ci­ally in the assem­bly of heating, air condi­tio­ning and venti­la­tion tech­no­logy, as well as in the mari­time sector for marine equip­ment and various indus­trial appli­ca­ti­ons. The aim of the acqui­si­tion is to accom­pany the long-term inter­na­tio­nal growth of the group and to focus MÜPRO on its core compe­ten­cies — deve­lo­p­ment, consul­ting and project support.

The previous company owner, Harald Müller, as well as part of the former Secura manage­ment will focus on buil­ding digi­tal products and services for medium-sized busi­nesses with the newly foun­ded SYMBIONET AG as of Febru­ary 2018. SYMBIONET’s areas of exper­tise are sales soft­ware and plat­form solu­ti­ons, auto­ma­ted logi­stics services as well as online trading and marke­ting services. The foun­da­tion for the new busi­ness model has alre­ady been laid in recent years as part of the digi­tiza­tion process at the Secura Group.

Dr. Chris­tian Hollen­berg (photo), foun­ding part­ner of Perusa, explains, “MÜPRO has an impres­sive history as a leading supplier in this market. In the future, the company will focus enti­rely on its core compe­ten­cies in engi­nee­ring, consul­ting, project support, and the deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion of high-quality fastening tech­no­logy.” Harald Müller elabo­ra­tes: “The tran­sac­tion provi­des MÜPRO with addi­tio­nal resour­ces to imple­ment its stra­tegy in the long term. Both groups — MÜPRO and SYMBIONET — can now conti­nue to grow profi­ta­bly in the future based on their diffe­rent busi­ness models.”

The buyer Perusa Part­ners Fund II L.P. and its co-inves­tors were advi­sed in the tran­sac­tion by KPMG (Commer­cial), Deloitte (Finan­cial, Tax), Gütt Olk Feld­haus (Legal), Valleé & Part­ner (Logi­stics) and TÜV Süd (Envi­ron­men­tal). Network Corpo­rate Finance struc­tu­red and raised the acqui­si­tion finan­cing as debt advisor.

Secura Indus­trie­be­tei­li­gun­gen AG and the seller were advi­sed in the tran­sac­tion by ZETRA Inter­na­tio­nal, Zurich (Exclu­sive M&A Advi­sor), Froriep Legal, Zurich (Legal), Luther Rechts­an­wälte, Frank­furt (Legal), and Tax Part­ner, Zurich (Tax).

About Perusa
Perusa GmbH is an inde­pen­dent consul­ting company that curr­ently advi­ses two funds with €350 million in equity capi­tal and, on a case-by-case basis, co-inves­tors on invest­ments in medium-sized compa­nies and group busi­nesses from German-spea­king or Scan­di­na­vian countries.

About MÜPRO
With conso­li­da­ted sales of around EUR 95 million, MÜPRO is one of the leading suppli­ers of fastening and sound insu­la­tion tech­no­logy for buil­dings and ships. Its products can be found in single-family and multi-family homes as well as in large-scale struc­tu­ral projects, in indus­trial plants and on ships. The company, which has been in busi­ness since 1964, has its own sales offices in 14 count­ries as well as sales part­ners in 40 other markets and also masters special areas of fastening tech­no­logy such as clean room and tunnel, preven­tive struc­tu­ral fire protec­tion, fire-tested fastening or fastening for heavy loads.

Duisburg/ Colo­gne — With a team led by Dr. Pär Johans­son, Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek advi­sed Franz Haniel & Cie. GmbH (Haniel) on the acqui­si­tion of Opti­mar, a leading supplier of auto­ma­ted fish proces­sing systems. The sellers are the Norwe­gian finan­cial inves­tors Credo Part­ners and the company’s manage­ment. The exis­ting manage­ment team around CEO Håvard Sætre will conti­nue to run Opti­mar as part of the Haniel Group. With this acqui­si­tion, Haniel is further expan­ding its port­fo­lio in an inno­va­tive busi­ness area.

Haniel, head­quar­te­red in Duis­burg, is a German family-owned company. There are curr­ently six divi­si­ons in the Haniel port­fo­lio: Bekaert­Des­lee, CWS-boco, ELG, Opti­mar, ROVEMA and TAKKT. In addi­tion, there are finan­cial invest­ments in Ceco­nomy and Metro. With over 13,800 employees, the Haniel Group gene­ra­ted €3.6 billion in reve­nue in 2016.

Opti­mar is a fast-growing Norwe­gian premium supplier of auto­ma­ted fish proces­sing systems. The company deve­lops, manu­fac­tures and installs solu­ti­ons for use on ships, on land and for aquacul­ture. Over the past two years, the company, head­quar­te­red in Ålesund on Norway’s west coast, has grown stron­gly, gene­ra­ting sales of appro­xi­m­ately €115 million in 2017.

Advi­sor Franz Haniel & Cie. GmbH: Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek
Dr. Pär Johans­son (Lead Partner),
Dr. Chris­toph Schork, LL.M.,
Tim Remmel, LL.M. (all Corporate/M&A), all Cologne
Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (Anti­trust Law), Hamburg

Erlangen/Munich/Landshut — GME German Medi­cal Engi­nee­ring GmbH, Erlan­gen, has bought back the shares in the company held by BayBG Baye­ri­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft and Bayern Kapi­tal GmbH (owner’s buy-back). The two invest­ment compa­nies had joined the medi­cal tech­no­logy company, which specia­li­zes in derma­to­lo­gi­cal lasers, as inves­tors in 2011 and 2013, respectively.

“The commit­ment of the invest­ment compa­nies enab­led GME to imple­ment a dyna­mic deve­lo­p­ment with balan­ced finan­cing during the growth phase. Our powerful, porta­ble lasers are now in use in more than 40 count­ries,” says Dr. Stefan Schulze, Mana­ging Part­ner of GME. With the conti­nuously incre­asing sales, which now amount to € 5 million annu­ally, earnings also increased and this enab­led the company and its share­hol­ders to exer­cise the option of a buy-back given by the asso­cia­ted compa­nies. “This is a first step towards reali­zing our medium-term goal of 100 percent owner­ship. We are deligh­ted that BayBG and Bayern Kapi­tal have given us this oppor­tu­nity after years of successful coope­ra­tion.” HTGF remains inves­ted for the time being, and will conti­nue to support GME’s development.

Foun­ded in 2011, the high-tech company stands for high-perfor­mance porta­ble laser devices for medi­cine and cosme­tics. GME devices are used, for exam­ple, for perma­nent hair removal, skin tigh­tening or the treat­ment of skin dise­a­ses such as psoria­sis or white skin cancer (acti­nic keratoses).

“Demo­gra­phic deve­lo­p­ments combi­ned with growing health aware­ness and modern beauty ideals mean that demand for derma­to­lo­gi­cally appli­ca­ble devices based on laser and light systems will conti­nue to increase,” BayBG invest­ment mana­ger Otto Hopf­ner is convin­ced. “GME is excel­lently posi­tio­ned with its pionee­ring laser tech­no­logy and will conti­nue on its path to success.” Dr. Natha­lie Weitemeyer, Bayern Kapi­tal, agrees: “GME stands out in this growing market thanks to a number of unique selling points and special features, such as a new tech­no­logy that allows the lasers to be parti­cu­larly compact.” All those invol­ved are satis­fied with the many years of coope­ra­tion: We thank GME for the coope­ra­tion and wish the company contin­ued success,” Hopf­ner and Weitemeyer agreed.

About GME German Medi­cal Engi­nee­ring GmbH
GME was foun­ded in June 2011 by four indus­try experts. Product deve­lo­p­ment takes place in Erlan­gen with a team of expe­ri­en­ced engi­neers and tech­ni­ci­ans. GME combi­nes exten­sive appli­ca­tion know­ledge with state-of-the art elec­tro­nics and robust beam sources desi­gned for conti­nuous use in indus­trial appli­ca­ti­ons. This allows new deve­lo­p­ments to be imple­men­ted quickly and effi­ci­ently. www.gmeonline.de

About BayBG
BayBG Baye­ri­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft mbH is one of the largest private equity and venture capi­tal compa­nies for medium-sized compa­nies. It curr­ently has commit­ments of 315 million euros to around 500 compa­nies. With its venture capi­tal and equity invest­ments, it enables small and medium-sized compa­nies to imple­ment inno­va­tion and growth projects, arrange for company succes­sion or opti­mize their capi­tal struc­ture. Since 1972, BayBG has accom­pa­nied more than 3,000 compa­nies on their path to success. www.baybg.de

About Bayern Kapital
Bayern Kapi­tal GmbH, Lands­hut, was foun­ded in 1995 as a wholly owned subsi­diary of LfA Förder­bank Bayern. As the venture capi­tal company of the Free State of Bava­ria, Bayern Kapi­tal provi­des the foun­ders of inno­va­tive high-tech compa­nies and young, inno­va­tive tech­no­logy compa­nies in Bava­ria with equity capi­tal inclu­ding the growth phase. To date, Bayern Kapi­tal has inves­ted around 238 million euros of venture capi­tal in 250 inno­va­tive tech­no­logy-orien­ted compa­nies from a wide range of sectors. www.bayernkapital.de

About High-Tech Gründerfonds
The High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) has been a powerful engine for successful high-tech foun­ders since 2005. With know-how, entre­pre­neu­rial spirit and passion, the expe­ri­en­ced team of invest­ment mana­gers and startup experts accom­pa­nies the best compa­nies on their way from foun­da­tion to success. With a volume of EUR 886 million distri­bu­ted across three funds and an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner network, HTGF has now finan­ced almost 500 start­ups. www.high-tech-gruenderfonds.de

Colo­gne — A team led by Dr. Pär Johans­son from Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek ’s Colo­gne office advi­sed Odewald KMU II, a German invest­ment company specia­li­zing in medium-sized compa­nies, on the acqui­si­tion of Langer & Laumann Inge­nieur­büro GmbH from Nordwalde.

Langer & Laumann Inge­nieur­büro GmbH specia­li­zes in the instal­la­tion and moder­niza­tion of door drives for eleva­tors and safety doors on or in machi­nes. The previous mana­ging majo­rity share­hol­ders have taken a reverse stake in the tran­sac­tion. They will conti­nue to lead the group.

The Odewald KMU II Fund has a volume of 200 million euros and invests in a focu­sed manner in attrac­tive target markets in German-spea­king SMEs. The indus­try focus is on profi­ta­ble, fast-growing medium-sized compa­nies in the fields of “German engi­nee­ring”, intel­li­gent services and health­care. The typi­cal invest­ment occa­si­ons are succes­sion arran­ge­ments and/or growth finan­cing. These compa­nies gene­rally gene­rate sales of between 20 and 100 million euros, have entre­pre­neu­rial manage­ment, are very successful opera­tio­nally and occupy a leading posi­tion in the rele­vant market. Equity invest­ments of 5 to 30 million euros are made per transaction.

The acqui­si­tion of Langer & Laumann Inge­nieur­büro GmbH is the third invest­ment of Odewald’s second SME fund, follo­wing the acqui­si­tion of Betten Duscher Group in summer 2016 and Karl Schmidt Group in early 2017, on which Dr. Pär Johans­son and his team also advi­sed Odewald KMU. The Colo­gne M&A team works regu­larly with Odewald KMU and has alre­ady advi­sed on all tran­sac­tions of the first fund.

Advi­sor Odewald KMU II: Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek
Dr. Pär Johansson,
Dr. Chris­toph Schork, LL.M. (both M&A),
Tim Remmel, LL.M.,
Dr. Sascha Sche­wiola (Labor Law),
Dr. Verena Hoene, LL.M. (IP), all Cologne

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.

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) acqui­res an inte­rest in netz­kon­tor nord GmbH (netz­kon­tor), a provi­der of services for the tele­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons indus­try. As part of a manage­ment buy-out (MBO), DBAG ECF, which is mana­ged by DBAG, will acquire the majo­rity of shares in netz­kon­tor. The remai­ning shares will remain with the foun­ders and previous sole owners Dirk Müller and Peter Schmidt, who will conti­nue to work for the company as mana­ging part­ners. For its co-invest­ment along­side DBAG ECF, DBAG will invest up to EUR 4.6 million from its balance sheet. The purchase agree­ment was signed at the end of Decem­ber and is expec­ted to be comple­ted in Janu­ary 2018. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

netz­kon­tor is alre­ady the second invest­ment of the DBAG ECF since the start of its first new invest­ment period, DBAG ECF I for short, in June 2017. This means that more than a quar­ter of the commit­ted capi­tal has been drawn down.

netz­kon­tor (www.netzkontor-nord.de) was foun­ded in 2008 and opera­tes with around 100 employees in two busi­ness areas. Under the brand name “netz­kon­tor”, the company offers services rela­ted to the plan­ning and moni­to­ring of the cons­truc­tion of fiber optic networks. The OpenXS subsi­diary hand­les network manage­ment for fiber-optic network opera­tors. The regio­nal focus so far has been on Schles­wig-Holstein. In addi­tion to its head­quar­ters in Flens­burg, netz­kon­tor opera­tes from two other loca­ti­ons. With the recently opened branch in Schwe­rin, the company is also active in Meck­len­burg-Vorpom­mern. In 2017, netz­kon­tor gene­ra­ted sales of around eight million euros.

Demand for fast Inter­net connec­tions by private house­holds and compa­nies is incre­asing. So far, howe­ver, broad­band expan­sion in Germany has been slug­gish by Euro­pean stan­dards. It is ther­e­fore also supported by subsi­dies from the fede­ral budget. More than 40 million house­holds in Germany are not yet connec­ted to a fiber optic line. In this favorable market envi­ron­ment, netz­kon­tor bene­fits from its good repu­ta­tion as a relia­ble quality provi­der and from its exper­tise in project manage­ment. The company’s regio­nal expan­sion and the diver­si­fi­ca­tion of its custo­mer base are also to be driven forward by corpo­rate acquisitions.

“With the MBO of netz­kon­tor, DBAG is inves­t­ing in a well-posi­tio­ned service company in a fast-growing market,” said Tors­ten Grede, Spokes­man of the Board of Manage­ment of Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG on the occa­sion of the signing of the agree­ment. “We intend to support the company in its further deve­lo­p­ment with our exper­tise from DBAG’s exis­ting three invest­ments in this sector.”

“netz­kon­tor should conti­nue to bene­fit from the posi­tive market trend and the growing demand for broad­band connec­tions in the future,” said Peter Schmidt, mana­ging part­ner of netz­kon­tor. “In DBAG, we have found an expe­ri­en­ced part­ner with whose support the deve­lo­p­ment steps requi­red for this will be even easier for us.”

About DBAG
Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, a listed company, initia­tes closed-end private equity funds and invests along­side DBAG funds in well-posi­tio­ned medium-sized compa­nies with deve­lo­p­ment poten­tial. DBAG focu­ses on indus­trial sectors in which German SMEs are parti­cu­larly strong by inter­na­tio­nal stan­dards. With this expe­ri­ence, know-how and equity, it streng­thens the port­fo­lio compa­nies in imple­men­ting a long-term, value-enhan­cing corpo­rate stra­tegy. The entre­pre­neu­rial invest­ment approach makes DBAG a sought-after invest­ment part­ner in the German-spea­king region. The capi­tal mana­ged and advi­sed by the DBAG Group amounts to appro­xi­m­ately 1.8 billion euros.

Frank­furt a. Main — The private equity company Main Capi­tal has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in the Mann­heim-based soft­ware company JobRou­ter AG. In the context of the sale of its stake, one of the previous share­hol­ders of JobRou­ter AG was advi­sed by an M&A and private equity team of Bryan Cave in Frank­furt, led by Dr. Tobias Fenck.

The new inves­tor will provide the company with further growth capi­tal. The aim of the invest­ment is to expand the busi­ness model for BPM and docu­ment manage­ment, inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion and stra­te­gic add-on acquisitions.

JobRou­ter AG is an inter­na­tio­nal manu­fac­tu­rer of a web-based low-code plat­form for compre­hen­sive enter­prise digi­tiza­tion. The offe­ring includes highly scalable work­flow and docu­ment manage­ment compon­ents that enable busi­ness proces­ses to be mapped and auto­ma­ted digi­tally. The product port­fo­lio also includes stan­dar­di­zed solu­tion templa­tes for rapid busi­ness trans­for­ma­tion, indus­try-speci­fic process solu­ti­ons and a cloud instance in over 18 languages. The company relies on an exten­sive network of more than 160 part­ners. Custo­mers include, for exam­ple, EY, Thomas Cook and ThyssenKrupp.

Advi­sor to share­hol­der JobRou­ter AG: Bryan Cave Frankfurt
Dr. Tobias Fenck, Mana­ging Part­ner (Lead Part­ner, Corpo­rate, M&A, Private Equity), Stefan Skulesch, Of Coun­sel (Tax), Robert Schind­ler, Asso­ciate (Corpo­rate)

About Main Capital
Main Capi­tal is a private equity inves­tor with an exclu­sive focus on the soft­ware indus­try. In this indus­try, we are the most specia­li­zed party for manage­ment buyouts and later-stage growth capi­tal. With an expe­ri­en­ced team of profes­sio­nals, Main Capi­tal now mana­ges four private equity funds with assets under manage­ment of appro­xi­m­ately 375 million euros. — Main Capi­tal focu­ses exclu­si­vely on estab­lished and growing SaaS and soft­ware compa­nies with an inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion stra­tegy. Since its foun­ding in 2003, Main Capi­tal has built a proven track record and a large network in the soft­ware industry.

Main Capi­tal assists in the reor­ga­niza­tion of company holdings and stri­ves to bring soft­ware compa­nies to a higher level in terms of market posi­tion, busi­ness model and size. Subse­quently, an attrac­tive exit is targe­ted toge­ther with the foun­ders and/or the management.

About Bryan Cave LLP
Bryan Cave LLP (www.bryancave.com) is one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal law firms with appro­xi­m­ately 900 attor­neys in 25 offices throug­hout the United States, Europe and Asia. The firm advi­ses a wide range of clients from corpo­ra­ti­ons to finan­cial insti­tu­ti­ons and orga­niza­ti­ons to indi­vi­du­als. These include inter­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons, large and medium-sized family busi­nesses, part­ner­ships, non-profit orga­niza­ti­ons and start-ups. Based on many years of trustful coope­ra­tion, exten­sive legal expe­ri­ence, inno­va­tive strength and a colla­bo­ra­tive corpo­rate culture, we support our clients in the most important econo­mic and finan­cial markets — with a clear focus on tran­sac­tions, liti­ga­tion and regulation.

 

Frankfurt/Main- Shear­man & Ster­ling has advi­sed the exis­ting share­hol­ders of Mein­Auto GmbH, inclu­ding Holtz­brinck Ventures GmbH, Global Foun­ders Capi­tal GmbH & Co Betei­li­gungs KG Nr. 1, Vorwerk Direct Selling Ventures GmbH and Mr. Nico­las Leut­wi­ler, on the sale of their shares to the British invest­ment company HgCa­pi­tal.

Mein­Auto GmbH is the leading Inter­net new car broker in Germany with MeinAuto.de. As a pioneer in the field of online new car sales, the Colo­gne-based company has deve­lo­ped from an up-and-coming start-up to an estab­lished player in the indus­try since its foun­ding in 2007. Today, the portal regis­ters over 16 million website visi­tors annu­ally and coope­ra­tes with over 9,000 auto­mo­bile dealers throug­hout Germany.

The Shear­man & Ster­ling team, led by Dr. Alfred Koss­mann, included asso­cia­tes Dr. Aliresa Fatemi and Evelin Moini (all Frank­furt-Mergers & Acqui­si­ti­ons). In addi­tion, part­ner Simon Burrows (London-Mergers & Acqui­si­ti­ons), coun­sel Dr. Mathias Stöcker (Frank­furt-Anti­trust) and Dr. Anders Kraft (Frank­furt-Tax) as well as asso­cia­tes Dr. Phil­ipp Jaspers, Sven Opper­mann and Marc Lorenz (all Frank­furt-Mergers & Acqui­si­ti­ons) advi­sed on the transaction.

About Shear­man & Sterling
Shear­man & Ster­ling is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with 20 offices in 13 count­ries and appro­xi­m­ately 850 lawy­ers. In Germany, Shear­man & Ster­ling is repre­sen­ted at the Frank­furt office. The firm is one of the inter­na­tio­nal market leaders in advi­sing on complex cross-border tran­sac­tions. World­wide, Shear­man & Ster­ling prima­rily advi­ses inter­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons and large natio­nal compa­nies, finan­cial insti­tu­ti­ons, and large mid-sized compa­nies. For more infor­ma­tion, visitwww.shearman.com/de.

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) is inves­t­ing in Sjølund A/S (Sjølund), a manu­fac­tu­rer of alumi­num and steel compon­ents for the wind power, rail­road, cons­truc­tion and engi­nee­ring indus­tries. In a manage­ment buy-out (MBO), DBAG ECF, which is mana­ged by DBAG, will acquire around 51 percent of the shares in Sjølund from the current sole owner and CEO Søren Ravn Jensen.

DBAG will invest up to 4.5 million euros from its balance sheet for its co-invest­ment; in future, it will account for around 21 percent of the shares in Sjølund. The remai­ning appro­xi­m­ately 49 percent of the shares will in future be held by Søren Ravn Jensen, who will conti­nue to serve as CEO of the company, and other members of the manage­ment team. The purchase agree­ment was signed at the end of Decem­ber and is expec­ted to be comple­ted in Janu­ary 2018. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

Sjølund is the first invest­ment since the start of the first new invest­ment period of the DBAG ECF, or DBAG ECF I, in June 2017. The manage­ment buyout is also the second majo­rity invest­ment by the fund, which has also selec­tively provi­ded funds for MBOs since expan­ding its invest­ment crite­ria in 2016. Previously, the DBAG ECF had exclu­si­vely inves­ted in compa­nies on a mino­rity basis in order to promote their growth.

Since the previous sole owner and CEO Søren Ravn Jensen joined the company in 1994, Sjølund (www.sjoelund.com) has deve­lo­ped into one of the largest suppli­ers in the niche market for complex compon­ents made of bent alumi­num and steel. At the company’s head­quar­ters in Sjølund, Denmark, and at a produc­tion site in China, around 110 employees manu­fac­ture compon­ents that account for only a small propor­tion of their custo­mers’ mate­rial costs, but are nevert­hel­ess complex in many cases and often safety-rele­vant. These compon­ents are always manu­fac­tu­red accor­ding to the speci­fic requi­re­ments of the respec­tive custo­mer and distri­bu­ted globally — also via a third loca­tion in the USA. Sjølund also advi­ses its custo­mers on adap­ting products to the manu­fac­tu­ring process (“Design for Manu­fac­tu­ring”). In this way, the company has built up stable custo­mer rela­ti­onships and a strong market posi­tion. It gene­ra­ted a good half of its total sales of around 31 million euros in the wind power indus­try in fiscal year 2016/2017 (Septem­ber 30), mainly with compon­ents for the nacel­les of wind turbi­nes. In the rail segment, Sjølund supplies train manu­fac­tu­r­ers with struc­tu­ral profiles and compon­ents for exte­rior clad­ding, for exam­ple for the front of the rail­car, the window frames or the boar­ding area.

Sjølund’s sales markets, some of which are not very cycli­cal, are expec­ted to grow signi­fi­cantly in the coming years. Drivers of this deve­lo­p­ment are mega­trends such as the use of rene­wa­ble ener­gies, global popu­la­tion growth and incre­asing urba­niza­tion. On this basis, Sjølund is to conti­nue to grow and expand inter­na­tio­nally — orga­ni­cally and through acqui­si­ti­ons: Busi­ness with exis­ting custo­mers in growth markets such as China and the USA is to be expan­ded; compon­ents for wind turbi­nes are also to be manu­fac­tu­red at the Chinese produc­tion site in the future. German custo­mers curr­ently account for around 35 percent of Sjølund’s sales. Another start­ing point for the stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment of the company is the realignment of its sales acti­vi­ties. They are to focus more stron­gly on the highly profi­ta­ble mecha­ni­cal engi­nee­ring sector.

“Sjølund is active in seve­ral growth markets at the same time and has by no means exhaus­ted its poten­tial to serve these markets,” said Dr. Rolf Schef­fels (photo), member of DBAG’s Manage­ment Board, on the occa­sion of today’s contract signing. “We see this, in combi­na­tion with its long-estab­lished custo­mer rela­ti­onships, as the promi­sing basis for the company’s contin­ued posi­tive deve­lo­p­ment — and thus an attrac­tive invest­ment oppor­tu­nity in one of DBAG’s core sectors.”

“Further inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion of the busi­ness is a prere­qui­site for Sjølund to reach the next stage of its deve­lo­p­ment,” commen­ted Søren Ravn Jensen, former sole owner and CEO of Sjølund. “We are plea­sed to have an expe­ri­en­ced part­ner in DBAG at our side who can support us with capi­tal and exper­tise in this important phase.”

About DBAG
Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, a listed company, initia­tes closed-end private equity funds and invests along­side DBAG funds in well-posi­tio­ned medium-sized compa­nies with deve­lo­p­ment poten­tial. DBAG focu­ses on indus­trial sectors in which German SMEs are parti­cu­larly strong by inter­na­tio­nal stan­dards. With this expe­ri­ence, know-how and equity, it streng­thens the port­fo­lio compa­nies in imple­men­ting a long-term, value-enhan­cing corpo­rate stra­tegy. The entre­pre­neu­rial invest­ment approach makes DBAG a sought-after invest­ment part­ner in the German-spea­king region. The capi­tal mana­ged and advi­sed by the DBAG Group amounts to appro­xi­m­ately 1.8 billion euros.

Hamburg - IDEX Health & Science today announ­ced the acqui­si­tion of thinXXS Micro­tech­no­logy AG. The acqui­si­tion is expec­ted to acce­le­rate growth in the micro­flui­dics consu­ma­bles busi­ness. The share­hol­ders of thinXXS Micro­tech­no­logy AG, inclu­ding the majo­rity share­hol­der PRICAP Venture Part­ners AG, were advi­sed by Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek on the sale of their shares to a subsi­diary of IDEX Corpo­ra­tion. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

thinXXS Micro­tech­no­logy, based in Zwei­brü­cken, Germany, is a leading company in the deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­ture of plas­tic disposable systems for the life scien­ces, point-of-care and vete­ri­nary markets. The acqui­si­tion estab­lishes IDEX Health & Science as a tech­no­logy leader in micro­flui­dics and streng­thens its growth focus on inte­gra­ted opto­flui­dic systems, compon­ents and advan­ced solu­ti­ons for its target industries.

Advi­sors to thinXXS Micro­tech­no­logy AG: Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek
Part­ner Dr. Michael Dröge, Part­ner Julia Cramer (both lead and M&A/Corporate), Fabian G. Gaffron (Tax), all Hamburg
Dr. Thors­ten Kuthe (Stock Corpo­ra­tion Law), Cologne
Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (Anti­trust Law)
Dr. Florian Wenk, LL.M. (Corpo­rate Law)
Dr. Chris­tina Etzel,
Sven Johann­sen (both Vendor Due Dili­gence), all Hamburg

Hamburg — Allen & Overy LLP has advi­sed Hamburg-based private bank M.M. Warburg & CO (AG & Co.) KGaA (“Warburg”) on the sale of its subsi­dia­ries Warburg Invest Luxem­bourg S.A. and M.M. Warburg & CO Luxem­bourg S.A. to Apex Group Ltd (“Apex”), a port­fo­lio company of Genstar Capi­tal. The two dive­s­ted subsi­dia­ries manage $50 billion in assets under manage­ment. Apex had previously acqui­red Deut­sche Bank’s Alter­na­tive Fund Service busi­ness, among others. — Warburg and Apex will enter into a stra­te­gic part­ner­ship for Luxem­bourg-based asset manage­ment services.

The tran­sac­tion is still subject to appr­oval by various regu­la­tory autho­ri­ties. Comple­tion is plan­ned for the second quar­ter of 2018. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose further details of the transaction.

By selling its two subsi­dia­ries, Warburg Bank intends to focus even more on growth in the German market and reduce the comple­xity of regu­la­tory requirements.

Advi­sor M.M. Warburg & CO: Allen & Overy Hamburg
The lead part­ner was Hamburg part­ner Dr. Nico­laus Ascher­feld (Corporate/M&A), with part­ners Dr. Heike Weber (Tax, Frank­furt), Dr. Alex­an­der Behrens (Inter­na­tio­nal Capi­tal Markets, Frank­furt), Dr. Börries Ahrens (Anti­trust, Hamburg) and Daniela Trötscher (Tax, Frank­furt); Of-Coun­sel Frank Herring (Inter­na­tio­nal Capi­tal Markets, Frank­furt), Coun­sel Max Lands­hut (Corporate/M&A, Hamburg), Senior Asso­ciate Marco Zingler (Inter­na­tio­nal Capi­tal Markets, Frank­furt) and Asso­cia­tes Dr. Stefan Witte (Corporate/M&A, Hamburg), Dr. Moritz Meis­ter (Corporate/M&A, Hamburg) and Dr. David Wagner (Labor Law, Hamburg).

From the Luxem­bourg office, part­ners Andre Marc (Corporate/M&A) and Henri Wagner (Inter­na­tio­nal Capi­tal Markets) as well as coun­sel Cathe­rine Di Lorenzo, Yannick Arbaut, Serge Hoff­mann, Gary Cywie and asso­ciate Franz Kerger advised.

The tran­sac­tion was advi­sed in-house by Dr. Chris­toph Greiner.

About Allen Overy
Allen & Overy is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with appro­xi­m­ately 5,400 employees, inclu­ding appro­xi­m­ately 550 part­ners, in 44 offices worldwide.

Allen & Overy is repre­sen­ted in Germany at its offices in Düssel­dorf, Frank­furt am Main, Hamburg and Munich with appro­xi­m­ately 220 lawy­ers, inclu­ding 49 part­ners. The lawy­ers advise leading natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies prima­rily in the areas of banking, finance and capi­tal markets law, corpo­rate law and M&A, tax law as well as other areas of busi­ness law.