Funds advised by Triton today announced the sale of logistics specialist Dematic, the global leader in warehouse technology and materials handling solutions, to private equity investor AEA Investors (“AEA”) and Teachers’ Private Capital (“TPC”), the private equity arm of Canadian pension fund Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. As part of the transaction, around € 450 million of outstanding bonds will be redeemed. Dematic has sales of approximately € 1 billion and serves world-wide leading customers with around 4,500 employees across the globe.The parties to the transaction have agreed not to disclose the purchase price.
“Today we are particularly well positioned in the growing retail and e-commerce segments. AEA and TPC have the track record, know-how and capital to support our growth strategy in this very attractive market,” said Roar Isaksen, President and CEO of Dematic.
Triton acquired Dematic from Siemens in 2006. At the time the company was a loss-making non-core business. Since then, Dematic has steadily improved its results. “Over the past six years, the management, board, employee representatives and all Dematic employees have done a fantastic job to turn the company into the highly profitable and technologically and geographically well-positioned global market leader in intralogistics,” said Peder Prahl, director of the General Partner of Triton Fund II. “We would like to thank everyone for their contribution during Triton’s ownership.”
In order to bring Dematic back to sustained profitability, the company, with the support of Triton, had to make significant new investments and to restructure its USA and German operations in 2007 and 2008. This did not only allow Dematic to successfully steer through the financial crisis of 2009, but also laid the foundation for where the company stands now: the independent profitable global market leader in the growing intralogistics market.
As part of the turnaround, Dematic simplified its corporate structures, shortened decision-making processes and improved accountability across the company by implementing a systematic approach to cost and operational efficiency. The company also significantly increased R&D expenditures and invested in the expansion of a dedicated customer services unit. Today, customer services are a major contributor to Dematic’s overall profit. Large investments in sales and in marketing have yielded strong results in markets such as North America, Europe and Australia. Asia has grown from almost nothing in 2006 into a substantial part of the business today.
Dematic’s international presence and leadership has been continuously expanded. The company made the complementary acquisition of HK systems in 2010 and has developed a new factory in Suzhou, China. “Both investments were milestones for boosting Dematic’s competitiveness in our two core markets USA and China and expanding our client list in the growing e-commerce segment,” said Roar Isaksen.
The sale, which is subject to the usual regulatory approval processes, is expected to be completed by January 2013.
