Three deals in as many months for marine firm
MARINE specialist James Fisher and Sons has made its third acquisition in less than three months, taking its total investment in bolt-on businesses to £27m.
It’s latest catch is Liverpool-based Hughes Marine Engineering, the holding company of Hughes Sub Surface Engineering, for up to £10m.
The Barrow-in-Furness-based business will pay an initial £9m in cash, with up to £1m more being paid, subject to profit targets being met by February 2017.
Hughes Sub Surface made a pre-tax profit of £1.6m last year. It was founded in 2005 to provide commercial diving and civil engineering services to underwater projects. The business operates in the marine renewables, power generation, oil and gas, and inshore civil engineering sectors.
Nick Henry, chief executive of James Fisher, said: “The operations of Hughes Sub Surface are complementary to those of James Fisher and, combined, they will broaden our range of services to the market, particularly to the renewable energy industry offshore.”
Just 10 days ago, James Fisher announced the £15m acquisition of Singaporean firm Lexmar, a provider of service and support of diving equipment and saturated diving systems.
It is impleting three 18 man twin bell saturation diving systems which James Fisher says is complementary to its specialist technical division.
In June the company bought Aberdeen-based Return to Scene (R2S), which provides visual asset management photographic capture services, digital media services and forensic services to the oil & gas and security sectors, out of administration for £2m.
