Italy’s mid-market private equity firm Igi sgr spa acquired a 100% stake in two SMEs in few days.
The firm led by the managing parter Matteo Cirla invested in Fimotec (a leader in the design, devemoplment and producing of solutiona and components for the mobile telecom networks and broadcasting industry) and Vimec (a leader in the design and building of stairlifts, chairlifts, stairclimbers and lifts for the elimination of architectural barriers).
Founded in 1933 by Giorgio Feige, Fimotec has subsidiaries in India, Singapore, Usa, Germny and France and reached 22 million euros in revenues in 2014 with a 25% ebitda margin. The company has been valued about 30 million euros, MF-Milano Finanza writes today, adding that the deal has been financed with a 15 million euros package by GE Capital, Banco Popolare and Bper banks. Igi has bought the capital of Fimotec in two steps from founder’s son and daugether and is now looking for a new management who will be able to develop the company’s business further maybe thorugh some acquisitions.
As far as Vimec is concerned instead, the company has been on sale since October 2013. It was controlled with a 90% stake by Emerald fund, managed by PM&Partners who bought it back in 2006. The rest of the capital was owned by Sigefi (8%) and the old shareholders. Vimec reached almost 50 million euros in revenues in 2014 and aims to overtake that figure in 2015. The company has more than 60k installations in italy and has commercial subsidiaries in Spain, France, United Kingdom and Poland having also a presence in Australia, New Zeland, South Africa, latin America and China.
Both deals have been closed by Igi sgr thorugh its Igi Investimenti Cinque and Igi Investimenti Cinque Parallel funds and represent the second and the third investments for these funds, that are now invested for a 50% of the whole committements. The first investment of the two funds had been the one in the capital of Rollon together with French private equity firm Chequers Capital (see here a previous post by BeBeez).
The two funds were renamed from Arca Impresa Tre and Arca Impresa Tre Parallel that were once managed by Arca Impresa Gestioni sgr, a private equity firm that igi sgr had bought in 2012 from a group of Italian cooperative banks.
Arca Impresa Tre raised 73 million euros in 2009 while Arca Impresa Tre Parallel raised 20 millions in December 2011 from Fondo Italiano d’Investimento and was born to co-invest proportionally with Arca Impresa Tre. The two funds however had not invested in any company yet at the date of the deal with Igi sgr.
