Private equity and international buyers drive North West deals market
THE North West Corporate Finance team at Grant Thornton has reported a substantial hike in deal values over the past 12 months, which it says has been driven by strong buyer appetite.
It acted on 11 transactions across a range of business sectors worth more that £350m, in the 12 months to the end of June.
Nearly half of these deals involved international parties from countries such as Japan, the Netherlands and the United States.
Deals included the private equity-based MBO at Bolton-based Vernacare, the manufacturer of single-use medical products, and the sale of Tastecard and Gourmet Society to buyout giant Bridgepoint. Overall nearly half of the deals have private equity involvement.
Key trends include strong levels of activity from both private equity firms and overseas buyers –which were active in more than half of the deals, it said.
Matthew Bryden-Smith, corporate finance director at Grant Thornton in the North West, believes that despite Brexit causing some inevitable uncertainty, the deals market regionally is in “good health,” particularly for vendors of mid-market growth businesses.
“The North West private equity market is really active. Manchester has one of the largest concentrations of PE houses in Europe and they are all looking for good quality management teams to back. Trade buyers could be active too as there are record amounts of cash on corporate balance sheets,” he said.
The signs for the coming year are highly positive with data group Experian ranking Grant Thornton as the region’s most active financial adviser during the first nine months of 2016, having completed 18 deals.
Nationally in the four weeks after the Brexit referendum, Grant Thornton’s M&A and Due Diligence teams advised on 21 deals with a cumulative value in excess of £800m.
