US insurance giant Prudential subscribed a 30 million euro bond in a private placement issued by Carco group, a Milan-based company producing and distributing sealing systems for all critical industrial applications. The deal allows Open Mind private equity fund to divest its 35% stake in carco’s shareholders capital, MF-Milano Finanza writes today,
More in detail, slightly less than 25% of the proceeds from the bond issue will be used by Carco to buyback its shares from Open Mind, while the rest of the money will finance the international growth of the group mostly in the US, after having grown in Europe in the last few years.
Carco’s ceo Andrea Chalp and managing director Bruno Lorenzi have selected some specific US companies as potential targets for their m&a campaign and the first acquisition is expected to be closed by the end of the year. Carco group reached 16 million euros in revenues in 2014 with a 25% ebitda margin and is expected to see its revenues to grow by 15% this year. In the medium term Carco aims at listing in a US Stock Exchange.
As for OpenMind, a Luxembourg Sicar managed by Domenico Grassi and Giovanni Saladino, the deal has been very successful as the fund reached an Irr above 30% per year since the investment in July 2013. Open Mind is sponsored by Italian insurance group Unipol Fondiaria Sai, which is a major investor in the Sicar and is represented in the investment committee by Gianluca Banfi.
Carco was advised by CBA and ReedSmith law firms as for the legal issues, while was supported by Medit Capital Partnersas for the financial issues and by  PwC as for the financial due diligence. Open Mind was advised by Gitti Raynaud & Partners law firm.
It is the second time this year that Prudential subscribes debt issued by an Italia SME. The first time happened last February, back then Prudential subscribed two bonds, for a total conisderation of 30 million euros, issued by Ama, a group producing components for agricultural machinery, aimed to repay Ama’s debt and finance the group’s invesdtments plan (see here a previous post by BeBeez).
