Financing to GVS spa, an Italian leading microfiltration company, which acquired US filtration company focused on automotive sector Kuss Filtration last July, closed in the last few days.
The seller was US private equity firm Industrial Opportunity Partners. As for the legal issues in the deal Gvs was supported by Ice Miller, while IOP and Kuss were advised by Robert W. Baird & Co. and Winston & Strawn.
Founded in 1949, Kuss has an extensive experience in the fuel filtration market. Â After the combination, Gvs will operate from 26 locations in 22 countries around the globe. Â The company will employ over 2300 employees and serve the healthcare, automotive, life science, personal protection, hvac and appliance industries, outdoor power equipment, powersport and on-and off highway commercial vehicle markets. Â Headquartered in Zola Pedrosa (xx), Gvs will then reach 230 million euros in revenues.
The deal was financed by  loans and a bond. As for the loans, a pool of banks (with Bnl Bnp Paribas, Mediobanca and Unicredit as bookrunners and mandated lead arranger and with Mediobanca who was also coordinator e facility agent) arranged a 90 million euros financing, MF Milano Finanza writes today, adding that the company issued a new 40 million euros bond which was subscribed in a private placement by Pricoa Capital Group (Prudential Financial group). Actually proceeds from the new bond have been used to refinance a previous 10 million euros bond issued by Gvs and subscribed by Pricoa itself.
Pricoa has been quite active in In investing in SMEs’ private debt in Italy in the last few years. The company had actually invested in bonds by Crif (50 million euros), global company specialising in the development and management of credit bureau services, business information systems and credit solutions; by Epta (20 millions), an international leader in refrigerating products for Gdo; by Carco (30 millions), producing and distributing sealing systems for all critical industrial applications; and by Ama (30 millions), producing components for agricultural machinery.
