News
Gresham exits Beck & Pollitzer
20 December 2004Gresham today announces it has made a successful exit from Beck & Pollitzer, one of Europe's leading engineering services contractors.
Gresham has realised its investment in Beck & Pollitzer through a £28.8m tertiary buy-out and achieved a 2.5x money multiple. Bank of Scotland Integrated Finance funded the transaction with a £27.6m integrated debt and equity package. The deal has allowed the directors, management and employees, to secure a majority of the shareholding in Beck & Pollitzer with Bank of Scotland taking a substantial minority stake.
Gresham originally invested £7.2m in the management buy-in buy-out of Beck & Pollitzer in March 1998 from Schroder Ventures.
Beck & Pollitzer specialises in the installation and relocation of industrial plant and machinery and operates throughout the world. Its headquarters are in Dartford, Kent, and it has operating locations throughout the UK and in Western and Central Europe.
The company has an extensive network of offices and has supported constant innovation to ensure that it is able to offer fully integrated project solutions using the latest technology.
Beck & Pollitzer's policy of continual investment has enabled it to become a world leader in the installation and transfer of manufacturing plant and process equipment. It has an extensive range of domestic and multinational blue chip clients operating in the automotive, paper, printing, pharmaceutical and packaging industries. The company has now grown to 330 employees and a turnover of £45m.
James Barbour-Smith, director at Gresham who sat on the Beck & Pollitzer board, said: ''This is a great British success story in what has been a turbulent manufacturing industry in recent years. Beck & Pollitzer has adapted to changes in the industry ensuring that it remains able to offer a high quality outsourced solution to blue chip companies.''
Tony Percival, managing director of Beck & Pollitzer, said: ''We have enjoyed good working relationships with a number of individuals at Gresham. Our partnership has ensured that the company is positioned well for future growth and I now look forward to working with the Bank of Scotland.''
Mike Innes, director of Integrated Finance at Bank of Scotland, said: ''We are delighted to have provided an integrated finance package that allows the existing management and employees to take control of Beck & Pollitzer, which is a market leader with an excellent reputation and a clear growth strategy.''
The sale of Beck & Pollitzer is the latest in a series of successful exits for Gresham - including the London Stock Exchange listing of office2office, the sale of Dimensions Holdings Limited to Johnson Service Group plc and the SBO of 1st Credit to Bridgepoint. The investments sold already in 2004 have generated an average of 4x money.
[Peter Gray] of Cavendish Corporate Finance advised Gresham and management on the transaction.
Contact
Gresham
James Barbour-Smith 020 7309 5000
Trimedia
William Baldwin-Charles 020 7898 9376
Gresham LLP
Gresham is the regionally based UK private equity house specialising in investing in mid-market companies. Transactions are typically valued at between £5m and £75m. The group focuses on management buy-outs, buy and build opportunities and transactions requiring expansion and replacement capital. Gresham's offices in London, Birmingham and Manchester give direct access to the main centres of UK buy-out activity. This regional focus provides strong local knowledge and a network of contacts essential to sourcing new deals and effectively working with management teams across the UK.
A focused portfolio management team works alongside investee companies in dealing with key commercial and financial aspects of the business to enhance the value of an investment and to focus on profitable exits. Gresham has a strong proprietary origination function which accounts for more than 50% of its lead investments. Gresham has a successful investment track record with a gross realised investment return of 34 per cent and a cash return of 2.7 times on 114 investments made since 1980.
Gresham undertook its own buy-out from Zurich Financial Services in February 2003 to create an independent business owned by the management team. In May 2004, Gresham announced it had raised £237m in its Gresham III fund, comfortably exceeding its target of £200m. Investors committing funds to Gresham III comprise pension funds, fund of funds, banks and insurers from the UK, continental Europe, Asia and the US. Investors include Access Capital, Alpinvest, ATP Private Equity Partners, Bank of Scotland, Henderson Global Investors, Swiss Re, the West Midlands Metropolitan Authority Pension Fund and Wilshire.
Gresham surveys the corporate health of the UK mid-market in its bi-annual independent research, the Gresham Monitor. The most recent Gresham Monitor research was published in June 2004. Previous Monitor research and further information about Gresham and its investments is available from www.gresham.vc.