European buyout firm Bridgepoint has sold Hydrex Group, a UK specialist supplier of mobile operated equipment and associated support services for the UK rail and materials handling sector, in a £106 million deal (€154 million; $184 million).
Bridgepoint has sold the business to Luxembourg-listed investment house Quilvest and Saudi Arabia’s Shoaibi Group, which is active in the oil, gas, petrochemicals, utilities, IT and telecoms space. Debt for the transaction was provided by Barclays.
Bridgepoint originally invested £15 million in Hydrex in March 2002, supporting a £36 million management buyout. The exit is understood to have generated a money multiple of 3x for Bridgepoint.
Since its original acquisition, Bridgepoint has provided additional funding for two of the four bolt-on acquisitions Hydrex has made in the past four years, mainly in the UK rail and specialist materials handling markets.
Alan Payne, a director at Bridgepoint in London, said in a statement that Hydrex had seen significant growth through successfully securing customers who outsource their specialist equipment needs under long-term contracts.
Founded in 1985 and based in Bristol, Hydrex’s customer base comprises specialist infrastructure maintenance and track renewal contractors as well as waste handling businesses.
Hydrex is Bridgepoint’s third major exit this year, following the sale of Spanish wind farm developer CESA to Acciona in a €1.47 billion ($1.76 billion) deal in January; and the divestment of Robinia, a UK specialist health care provider, to Barclays Private Equity for £80 million, also in January.
Bridgepoint sells Hydrex for 3x cash
The London-based mid-market investor has sold equipment supplier Hydrex to Quilvest and the Shoaibi Group for £106m.
