Beech Tree sells Nottingham tech firm to Macquarie Capital

Private equity investor Beech Tree has sold Wavenet, a cloud telecoms, IT and technology managed services provider, to Macquarie Capital Principal Finance.

Beech Tree invested in Wavenet in 2016 after identifying the potential for growth and Wavenet’s unique position as both an internet service provider (ISP) and managed service provider (MSP).

Over the past five years, Wavenet has grown from from £14m turnover in 2016 to over £60m this year, through a mixture of acquisitions and strong organic growth. There has also been significant investment made in the people, network, products and systems, which has resulted in Wavenet being able to support large scale enterprise solutions including its recent win of DVLA’s contact centre and back-office.

Formed in 2000, Wavenet has over over 8,000 SME and enterprise customers and offices in Solihull, Chester, Norwich, Cardiff, St Albans and Nottingham. The company employs over 200 people, including over 100 trained support staff and engineers.

Paul Franks, managing partner at Beech Tree Private Equity, said: “We are delighted to have worked with Bill and the management team at Wavenet over the past five years. The business has grown substantially – both in scale and capability, including 8 bolt-on acquisitions. Wavenet is now one of the stand-out unified communications players in the UK market. I wish Macquarie and Wavenet every success for the future.”

Bill Dawson, CEO at Wavenet, added: “I am extremely grateful for Beech Tree’s support and advice over the last five years, the team have been integral in empowering the expansion and development which has resulted in our fantastic growth. As a team, we are excited to continue to build on this growth as we enter our new partnership with Macquarie. I am confident that the passion and quality of our people, management and infrastructure combined with Macquarie’s experience will drive us to even greater success in the future.”