Italy’s private equity weekly roundup. News from HOPE, Mecaer, Sonnedix, Unigestion, Cerved, Fedrigoni, Genoa Calcio, Sisal, Divella and more

HOPE (Holding di Partecipazioni Economiche), a fund that invests in SMEs that is available to retail investors, will list on Milan market for raising the resources for private equity and eco-friendly real estate and infrastructure transactions (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Banca d’Italia provided its authorization subject to the opinion of Consob, the Italian stock market regulator. HOPE has also the status of benefit company. The firm’s main owners are ceo Claudio Scardovi (3.6%), Unicredit (19%), Amundi (14.5%), Banca Generali (9%), Bnl (5.4%). Further investors with smaller stakes are: Cnp Unicredit Vita, Banco Bpm, Popolare di Ragusa, Banca Mediolanum, Banca Popolare di Puglia e Basillicata, Mauro Del Rio, Stefano Aversa, Piero Masera, Andrea Beltratti, Emilio Ottolenghi, Matteo and Paolo Zanetti, Alessandra Manuli, and Vito Rocca. HOPE aims to channel the savings of Italian households in the digital and eco-sustainable restructuring of the national system as well as achieving benefit-corporation and ESG targets. Stefano Caselli is HOPE’s ceo. The company aims to raise 500 million euros from retail and institutional investors for its Eltif. Sources said to BeBeez, that HOPE may place 30% of the stakes with institutional investors and the remaining with retail and invest 40% of the resources in corporates and 60% in real estate and infrastructures. HOPE’s shareholders poured 15.7 million in the business. The company’s directors are Francesco De Giglio, Mauro Del Rio, Nunzio Luciano, Alessandra Manuli, and Lucrezia Reichlin. The members of the sustainability advisory board are Anna Gervasoni, Carlo Ratti and Cinzia Tagliabue. Galeazzo Pecori Giraldi, Scardovi, Stefania Petruccioli and Stefano Sostero make the corporate investment commitee. Beltratti, Armando Borghi, Luca Malighetti and Mirko Tironi are part of the sustainable cities investment board. 

Private Equity Partners, a fund that Fabio Sattin and Giovanni Campolo created, sold its 22.5% stake in Mecaer Aviation Group that acquired in 2007 on the ground of an equity value in the region of 38 million euros together with then Imi Private Equity (now merged in Intesa Sanpaolo), who purchased a 16.4% (see here a previous post by BeBeez). FSI and Stellex Capital Management acquired the majority of Mecaer, a producer of components for areonautics, for an enterprise value of above 100 million. The company’s chairman and ceo Bruno Spagnolini also invested in the company. NB Renaissance Partners also sold a 17% of Mecaer which was born in 1995 after a spinoff of Milan-listed Finmeccanica that a club deal platform of Families acquired and now will hold a minority of the business. The buyers aim to boost Mecaer’s turnover to 500 million euros in 6 to 7 years through M&A transactions. Mecaer has sales of 138 million, an ebitda of 14.9 million and a net debt of 18.2 millions.

Sonnedix, a solar energy company that belongs to JPMorgan Asset Management, acquired a portfolio of photovoltaic plants with a power of 11.4MW from Swiss asset manager ZHC Holding AG (see here a previous post by BeBeez) Sonnedix now owns 148 projects with a total power of 318 MW, ceo Axel Thiemann said.  

In 1H21, international private equity funds frequently carried on exits through the secondary market for providing Limited Partners with cash and speeding up the fundraising, said a report of Unigestion, a French asset manager with resources of 22.1 billion euros (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The funds are implementing such a strategy through GPs (General Partners)-Led Transactions. The total value of private equity exits amounted to 323 billion (+74% than 1H20). Many funds launched IPOs for selling their assets. Unigestion said that even though the funds’ divestment activity is intense, the total distributions of the private equity to their investors may not match the high capital calls as the investment flow is also robust. Therefore, investors may get negative cash flows from their private equity programmes for the third consecutive year. These dynamics provide a boost for the secondary market as Limited Partners (LPs) are selling their investments in private equity funds.  

Cerved’s board of directors said that there is still room for improvement for the bid price of ION, FSI and GIC, even if now the price is just fair enough (see here a previous post by BeBeez). At the end of August, the bidders increased their offer from 9.50 to 10.20 euros per share for an enterprise value of Cerved of 11.1X ebitda 2019 and 12.9X ebitda 2020. However, the value of the comparable credit information companies amounts to 19.1X ebitda 2019 and 16.6X ebitda 2020. The value of the comparable credit management firms is of 6.9X ebitda 2019 and 8.4X ebitda 2020. Cerved’s ceo Gianandrea De Bernardis said that the bid is still in the lower range of adequacy that the advisors UBS, Morgan Stanley and Mediobanca outlined. UBS said that a fair value of the bid should be of 9.7 – 12.1 euros; Morgan Stanley 10 – 11.7 euros; Mediobanca 10.2 – 14.1 euros. ION, the investment holding of Andrea Pignataro, GIC and FSI (9% owner of ION) also reportedly decided to delay from 31 August, Tuesday, to 9 September, Thursday, the deadline for accepting their offer and increased the threshold to 80% (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The bidders also increased the credit lines for supporting the bids from 1.65 to 1.68 billion euros, while they will invest proprietary resources for 970 million.  

Fedrigoni, an Italian producer of special papers that belongs to Bain Capital since 2017, acquired 70% of a newco that will manufacture items in thermoformed pulp (see here a previous post by BeBeez). The asset is a spin-off of Tecnoform which will keep a 30% stake. Fedrigoni aims to achieve sales of 25 million euros in the next 2-3 years for this business. Tecnoform has sales of above 20 million. Fedrigoni has a turnover of 1.3 billion, an adjusted ebitda of 166.4 million and a net financial debt of 626.6 million.   

Germany’s Remira, a provider of IT solutions for the supply chain of all the industriall sectors that since November 2018 belongs to Elvaston Capital Management, acquired Kyklos and its Romanian subsidiary Eklos from the managers and the ceo Lorenzo Azzari (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Kyklos publishes software and provides IT solutions for the fashion and luxury industry and has sales of 4.3 million euros, an ebitda in the region of 0.48 million and net cash of 0.53 million.  

 Genoa Calcio attracted the interest of US private equity 777 Partners (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Genoa’s chairman Enrico Preziosi said that he’s holding talks with potential buyers. Rumours say that the deadline for ending the negotiations between Genoa and the fund is mid-October. The buyer may pour a first instalment at the end of September. Steven W. Pasko and Josh Wander founded 777 Partners after the management buyout of SuttonParkCapital from PennantPark. Andres Blazquez heads 777 Partners in Europe. The investor already acquired a 6.28% of Spanish football club Sevilla in 2018. Preziosi could sell the whole Genoa to 777 Partners. However, the vendor may also divest a stake and reinvest in the team with the fund. Alessandro Zarbano is the ceo of Genoa which has sales of 33.4 million euros and equity of 14.4 million.  

The licence for the management of the UK national lottery of Camelot, a portfolio company of Ontario Teachers, expired (See here a previous post by BeBeez). Such a concession attracted the interest of Sisal, an Italian gambling company that CVC acquired in 2016 for 1 billion euros from Apax Partners, Permira and Clessidra. Sisal recently signed a partnership with British Telecom for the technological management of the lottery and a charity agreement with Barnardo’s. Sisal has sales of 828 million and an adjusted ebitda of 255 million. The licence for the UK lottery is also of interest to Czech gambling company Sakza (who hired Keith Mills to this end) and to Richard Desmond, the manager of the Health Lottery.  

Italian midmarket M&A advisor Pirola Corporate Finance, hired Cristina Bertolini, Luca Accerenzi, Andreas Attanasio, and Ana Pino Gonzalez for the m&a practice that Matteo Giannobi leads (see here a previous post by BeBeez). All the new resources previously worked for Palladio and must contribute to the growth of Pirola Corporate Finance in the sectors of energy, food, packaging, pharma, and logistics.   

Italian food com Divella hired Vitale&Co as financial advisor for finding a strategic investors that may support its international expansion (see here a previous post by BeBeez). A report that Equita sim released on 1 September, Wednesday, said that Divella could attract the interest of Milan-listed competitor Newlat. Previous press reports quoted the ceo Vincenzo Divella as saying that he would preferably sell a stake to an US-based peer for increasing its presence in the area. Divella’s enterprise value could amount to more than 300 million euros. The company has sales of 300 million with an ebitda of 30 millions.