2012 deals review: Recruitment and retail to the fore
IN a market continually clouded with euro zone-related uncertainty, the North West deals market performed steadily, if not spectacularly in 2012.
A fourth quarter pick-up in activity saw two major transactions get over the line in December – the partial sale of Liverpool retailer B&M Bargains in a deal said to value the family-owned company at £900m.
The growth of B&M is a remarkable success story against an incredibly tough market place, but as the high street has suffered, B&M and others like it have thrived as customers sought-out brands at low prices.
B&M, which was wooed by a number of the world’s major private equity houses, opted to go with US-based Clayton Dubilier & Rice, which plans to internationalise the business in the coming years.
Liverpool-born forrmer Tesco chief executive Sir Terry Leahy, a senior adviser at CD&R, will serve as chairman to the Speke-based company which was built up by brothers Simon, Bobby and Robin Arora.
The business made profits of £38m profit last year on sales of more than £713m. Its success is down to not only to consumers seeking low prices, but its savvy stock buying.
Also completing in December, and representing a double success for investment bank Rothschild, was the sale of business travel operator ATPI by the Manchester office of private equity house Equistone.
While retail was a key theme for the 2012 deals market – the biggest transaction was Malcolm Walker’s £1.45bn buyout of Flintshire-based Iceland Foods – the North West recruitment sector saw high levels of activity, with Fircroft, NES, Air Energi and Morson Group, all changing hands.
Family-owned Fircroft, based in Warrington, sold a stake to Equisitone in a £140m deal, while Palatine Private Equity successfully exited Air Energi.
The biggest deal in the sector saw Altrincham-based NES Global Talent sold by its private equity owner Graphite Capital for £234m to US private investment group AEA Investors.
Meanwhile Morson, the Salford-based manpower services company, returned to private ownership of the Mason family in a £23m take-private deal in July.
With private equity houses driving deal activity, there was little activity on the domestic public markets, although Manchester United and Salford-based high performance metals group Luxfer, successfully list on Wall Street.
