Gas firm buys up two rivals
LEEDS-BASED gas suppliers innergy Group has snapped up two of its rivals.
Castleford-based Castle Energy Group and Harrogate’s HB Dobson have been acquired by the firm for an undisclosed sum.
Castle supplies hundreds of retail outlets and wholesalers with coal, charcoal, wood and bottled gas throughout Yorkshire, Humberside, Lancashire and the North Midlands whilst HB Dobson is a supplier of bottled gas to the local market.
Castle Energy will become innergy Solid Fuels Ltd and HB Dobson (Gas) Limited will be integrated into innergy LPG Ltd, divisions of the fast growing innergy Group.
The acquisitions are the fourth and fifth for innergy and part of their plans to achieve £10m in turnover by 2021. All employees will be transferred over to the group.
Gez Walsh, managing director of innergy said: “Both businesses have built a wonderful reputation with their customers for exceptional service, which is something that has always been a focus for us.
“We see fantastic opportunities to introduce Castle Energy’s product range into our customer base, coal to our network of Calor Gas stockists and catering charcoal to the pubs and restaurants who rely upon us for their drinks dispense gases. We also expect to achieve significant operational efficiencies from the HB Dobson acquisition, expanding our bottled gas offering further in North Yorkshire.”
Neil Mehta, managing director of Castle Energy who will stay on in an advisory capacity said: “It was important to me to be able to entrust Castle Energy and its customers to a company that shares our customer focus and understands the importance of being a considerate employer.”
Peter Dobson, managing director of HB Dobson, added that: “innergy has the expertise, ambitions and resources to grow the business further, while maintaining a significant degree of integrity in dealing with all stakeholders in the business.”
innergy were advised by the Mazars Leeds corporate finance team of Alex Baskeyfield, corporate finance director and Josh Thorneycroft, corporate finance executive and Gary Caplan from GC Business Lawyers. Funding was supported by Yorkshire Bank Commercial Finance.
Alex Baskeyfield, corporate finance director at Mazars, added: “innergy has an ambitious and well-funded growth plan. innergy’s strategy allows it to fairly price potential acquisitions whilst achieving excellent levels of return. We are working with innergy to build a pipeline of potential acquisitions and expect to see rapid progress in delivering on its ambitions.”
