Italy’s private equity weekly roundup. News from Etro, Prima Assicurazioni, Engineering, Lega Calcio Serie A, Investindustrial, Eni, Sicit, Tamburi and more

L-Catterton, whose Italian head is Luigi Feola, is holding exclusive talks with Italian fashion firm Etro, which appointed Rothschild as advisor (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The fund could acquire 60% of the business and leave with the eponymous family a 40% stake. The transaction value is in the region of 500 million euros. Gimmo Etro founded the company in 1968. His kids Jacopo, Kean, Veronica, and Ippolito currently run Etro and in September 2020 hired Stefano Sassi. Etro has sales of 285 million and an ebitda of 15.7 million.  

Alberto Genovese, an Italian entrepreneur that is reportedly facing a trial for sexual assault, hired Vitale & Associati and Angelo Provasoli for selling his take in Prima Assicurazioni, an Italian insurtech (See here a previous post by BeBeez). Genovese and Teodoro D’Ambrosio founded Prima in 2014. Prima currently belongs to First Technologies Holding (58.31%, a vehicle of which Genovese has 80% and D’Ambrosio 16%), Goldman Sachs Private Capital Investing and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities who acquired 40% of the firm in 2018 through the subscription of an investment round of 100 million euros. George Ottathycal has 1.78% of Prima which might be worth in the region of 900 million. The asset is of interest to Permira, Carlyle, Softbank, Vision fund, and Silicon Valley Bank, part of SVB Financial Group.  

Maximo Ibarra is leaving his role of ceo of Sky Italia for leading Engineering Ingegneria Informatica, an IT company that belongs to Bain Capital, NB Renaissance and NB Aurora (part of Neuberger Berman) (see here a previous post by BeBeez). On 29 April, Thursday, Engineering’s shareholders will officially appoint Ibarra, who will invest in Engineering. He is taking his new role starting from next July 1st.

Turnaround private equity funds may target 1700 firms in Italy, said a report that BackToProfit elaborated on behalf of AIFI, the Italian Association of Private Equity, Venture Capital and Private Debt (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The potential targets generate sales of 10 – 300 million euros (55 billion in aggregate) with a positive ebitda.  

Serie A’s teams Inter Milan, Juventus, Napoli, Lazio, Atalanta, Hellas Verona, and Fiorentina formally asked Lega Calcio Serie A chairman Paolo Dal Pino to resign from his role (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The clubs complained for the delay in signing a tv-rights deal with Dazn for favouring an agreement with the consortium CVC Capital Partners- Advent International-FSI who tabled a 1.7 billion euros bid for a 10% of a media company that would handle the broadcasting of the matches of Lega Calcio. However, Dal Pino has the support of Torino and AC Milan. On another hand, the European Super League project could  have also jeopardized the offer of Advent-CVC-FSI (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The Super League would have been an alternative to the current Champions League. The founding clubs would have received 3.5 billions (230-290 million to each club) for investing in infrastructure that JP Morgan was ready to finance (see here a previous post by BeBeez). UEFA, The English Football Association, Premier League, Spain’s Football Federation, LaLiga, Federcalcio italiana (FIGC), and Lega Serie A opposed to the project (see here a previous post by BeBeez) as well as the UK premier Boris Johnson. So Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United, Tottenham, Liverpool and Inter left the Super League which is then falling apart. Meanwhile. UEFA is working on investments worth 6 billion euros for reforming the format of Champions League with the support of Centricus Asset Management. Nizar Al Bassam and Dalinc Ariburnu founded Centricus, which has assets under management for 30 billion US Dollars.  

Investindustrial is carrying on a rich exit from NYSE-listed furniture group Knoll, in which invested 164 million US Dollars in June 2020 (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Investindustrial will actually get 253 million out of the merger of Knoll with Nasdaq-listed Herman Miller. Investindustrial also tabled a 200 million euros bid for acquiring a 49% stake of Barça Corporate, the merchandising unit of top tier European football team FC Barcellona. 

Milan-listed oil giant Eni is considering a dual track process (sale or ipo)  for its renewable energy assets and retail activities (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The company may fetch up to 3 billion euros out of a sale or a listing of a 20-30% of the assets that it would spin off for raising a further 2-3 billion debt for supporting the growth of the renewable energy business .

On 16 April, Friday, NB Renaissance announced its intention to launch a public offer at 16 euros per share for delisting Italian chemical company Sicit Group from Milan market (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Sicit listed in May 2019 after a business combination with Sprintitaly, a Spac. Intesa Holding owns 43.4% of Sicit whose shares closed at 16.6 euros (up 7.4%) after the news. Sicit has sales of 63.2 million, adjusted net profits of 14.6 million, an ebitda of 24.1 million, and net cash of 20.5 million.  

Mediobanca is auctioning again Remazel Engineering, a producer of machinery for the oil&gas and energy sector that belongs to Alpha Private Equity (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The vendors called off the sale in 2020 for the coronavirus turmoil. In 2014 Alpha acquired 60% of Remazel, while Miro Radici Family of Companies, Media Finanziaria di Partecipazione and Gianfranco Gamba kept 40%. In May 2019, Remazel acquired Italian cranes producer Concrane. The company has sales of 72.9 million euros, an ebitda of 9 million and net cash of 4.5 million.  

Tamburi Investment Partners (TIP) is ready to close down the vehicle TIP Pre-IPO (TIPO) that launched in 2014 and of which it owned 29.29% (see here a previous post by BeBeez). TIP acquired 70.71% of TIPO which had in its portfolio a 21.97% of Beta Utensili, and 20% of Sant’Agata, the controlling shareholder of Chiorino. TIP also acquired 14.18% of Beta Utensili (of which now owns 48.99%) and 41.58% of Betaclub. TIP paid 134.5 million euros for the deal.  

A club deal that Azimut Libera Impresa (Ali) led acquired a 70% stake in Arrow Special Parts, a producer of components for motorbikes, from the founder Giorgio Giannelli who kept the remaining stake (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Arrow has sales of 20 million euros with an ebitda of 3.6 million.  

F&P4BIZ (FP), a company that Guglielmo Fiocchi and Maurizio Perroni launched, led a club deal that acquired 74% of FARMA, a company operating in the field of design and implementation of refuelling systems for the industrial, commercial, agricultural and earthmoving vehicle sector (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The vendor Armando Poma and his son Andrea will keep their roles in the company together with the managers. BPER Banca, ICCREA and EMIL BANCA provided the financing for this acquisition. FARMA has sales of 15 million euros (50% abroad) with an above 20% ebitda margin.  

 A club deal that QCapital launched is about to acquire a 42.5% stake of Venpa, a company that rents aeral platforms (see here a previous post by BeBeez). QCapital will subscribe a 15 million euros capital increase of the target. Venpa will also get a credit line of 16 million from Banco BPM and Banca Ifis for refinancing its current liabilities and support future investments. QCapital’s founders are StefanoMiccinelli, Renato Peroni, Massimo Busetti, Giovanni Pedersoli, and Francesco Niutta (ceo). Venpa has sales of 41 million, an ebitda of 15.7 million (38% margin).  

Italy’s provider of 3D printing services Beamit acquired British competitor 3T Additive Manufacturing from Germany’s AM Global Holding (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Beamit has sales of 6.97 million euros, an ebitda of 54,000 euros, net cash of 12.6 million, and belongs to the Antolotti Family and Sweden’s Sandivk (30% since 2020).  

 Tommaso Ferrari will head as managing partner the investment banking division of Alantra in Italy (See here a previous post by BeBeez). Ferrari previously worked for UBI Banca as co-head of the corporate finance department, Banca IMI and UBS.  

Cassa del Trentino launched Fondo Crescita Equity (FCE), a vehicle for supporting the recovery of firms after the Covid-19 turmoil (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Cassa del Trentino already poured 20 million euros in the fund, which aims to attract further 80 million to invest in SMEs based in the North East of Italy.