Brad Meikle

3i in February announced it had led a GBP7.3 million (ecu 11.2 million) funding round for NeuTec Pharma in a private placing sponsored by Hoare Govett Corporate Finance. This leading-edge biotechnology company, which spun out of a University of Manchester research programme in 1996, specialises in the development of novel therapeutics for the treatment of […]

Procuritas Capital Partners II (PCP II) completed its third investment in mid-March, in parallel with its final close (story, page 9). The fund acquired the assets of Sandar Projekt AB, Sweden’s largest painting and decorating contractor, from the receivers for an undisclosed sum. Sandar Projekt, which serves mainly corporate clients and is also active in […]

Funds managed by CapMan Capital Management have taken an 85% stake in Tiimari, a leading Finnish retail chain, in a FMk 260 million (ecu 43 million) buyout from Rautakirja Oyj, a quoted Finnish group. The MBO team is headed by Kari Sulkanen, who founded Tiimari in 1975. Rautakirja bought the chain in 1990. Tiimari sells […]

Advent International and its Polish affiliate, Copernicus Capital Management, led a $3.2 million (ecu 2.9 million) development capital funding for Slag Recycling, a scrap and slag recycling operation based near Krakow. Slag Recycling is a joint venture with Huta Sendzimira (HTS), Poland’s second-largest steel mill, which is currently being privatised. The private equity backers have […]

Charterhouse SA led the buyout of SIA from its Swedish founder, Sonja Andersson, backing the deal alongside its new investor club for France (story, page 11). SIA is Europe’s largest wholesaler and distributor of “occasional” decorative items for the home, with a product range encompassing artificial flowers, table centres and decorations, Christmas decorations, ornaments, novelties […]

The institutions which backed a 1993 buyout of Hygiene Diffusion, a leasing French manufacturer of adult incontinence products, have sold the company in a FFr 576 million (ecu 87 million) MBO led by Electra Fleming. Hygiene Diffusion, which turned over FFr 555 million in 1997, has a 28% share of the adult incontinence protection market […]

In a classic LBU transaction CVC Capital Partners and AMP Asset Management Australia are providing further equity to support Laughton Rainsford’s GBP32.5 million (ecu 50 million) acquisition of Thomas Cork. The two groups jointly backed a GBP40 million MBI/MBO of Laughton Rainsfords last January. The management of Thomas Cork, which was itself the subject of […]

NatWest Equity Partners led the FMk 200 million (ecu 33 million) March buyout of Huurre, a Finnish commercial refrigeration products group. The transaction, the UK private equity house’s fourth deal in the Nordic region and its first in Finland, was executed by NWEP’s London-based dedicated Nordic team. Huurre’s product range encompasses chilled cabinets for drinks […]

Electra Fleming invested DM43 million (ecu 22 million) to back the MBO of WAP-Reiningungssysteme (WAP) from Jungheinrich. This deal was the first completed by Electra Fleming’s German subsidiary, established last autumn following the acquisition of FBG (EVCJ October/November 1997, page 6). WAP specialises in the manufacture of high-pressure cleaning systems, including wet and dry cleaners, […]

The travel sector in the past has had an uneasy relationship with the financial institutions of the City and provided mixed results to private equity financiers, particularly in the late 1980s and early 1990s when the industry was badly hit by recession. However, with 14.5 million holiday-makers expected to spend GBP10 billion travelling abroad this […]