Livingbridge acquires LDC-backed Giacom

Kenny Wastell
21 November 2017

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Livingbridge has backed the management buyout of cloud-based IT marketplace Giacom from LDC and the company's founder.

Financial details of the transaction remain undisclosed, though Livingbridge invested from its sixth buyout fund, which held a final close on £660m in September 2016 and targets companies with enterprise values between £20-75m.

The vendor has reinvested for a minority stake as part of the deal, which was led by Giacom chief executive Mike Wardell.

The deal comes just 18 months after LDC acquired a minority stake in the management buyout of the business. Since that investment, Giacom has launched proprietary technology platform Giacom Cloud Market and introduced three senior directors to its team. It has expanded its headcount from 34 to 47 and increased its revenues to £13.9m in the year ending in July 2017, up from £6.6m year-on-year, according to a statement.

Livingbridge said it anticipates strong organic growth for Giacom, resulting from SMEs migrating their applications and infrastructure into the cloud.

A spokesperson for LDC declined to comment on the returns generated from the transaction.

Company
Founded in 1999 and headquartered in Hull, Giacom is a marketplace that enables users to distribute cloud-based products and manage licences, in addition to offering IT support services. It is a Microsoft 2-Tier cloud service partner in the UK, enabling it to offer Microsoft products including Office 365 and Azure to service providers.

People
Livingbridge – Matthew Caffrey (partner).
LDC – Simon Braham, Philip Weston (investment directors); Jonathan Bell (director); Yann Souillard (head of London and the south).
Giacom – Mike Wardell (CEO).

Advisers
Equity – GCA Altium, Adrian Reed, Dominic Orsini (corporate finance); Pinsent Masons, Amie Norris, Gregg Davison (legal); KPMG, Chris Lloyd, Meredith Casey (debt advisory).
Vendor – KPMG, Christian Mayo, Graham Pearce, Nisha Sharma, Patrick Simpson, James Gaffney (corporate finance); Gateley, Paul Jefferson, Katie Porter (legal); TLT Solicitors (legal).