Partners-led consortium buys Techem for €4.6bn

Oscar Geen
25 May 2018

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Partners Group has led a consortium including Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) and Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan (OTPP) to acquire German energy metering business Techem from Macquarie Infrastructure for an enterprise value of €4.6bn.

Partners Group acquired a majority stake while both CDPQ and OTPP took minority positions of less than 25%, Unquote understands. The company's management also retained a small shareholding.

Macquarie made the divestment from Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund 2, which acquired the company in 2008.

Partners Group is spreading its equity investment across its PE and infrastructure funds at a ratio of 60/40 in favour of PE.

The sale was run by Deutsche Bank and JP Morgan, based on EBITDA of €350-370m, according to Unquote sister publication Mergermarket. This equates to an entry multiple of 12.4-13.1x, below the 14-15x that Macquarie was expecting, according to the Mergermarket report.

Techem reported EBITDA of €319.9m from €782.7m in sales for the year ending March 2017.

Previous funding
Macquarie acquired Techem in a take-private transaction in 2008. This followed a hostile takeover bid in October 2006, which failed in February 2007. BC Partners was involved as a white knight, but did not acquire any shares.

Company
Techem is a utility billing specialist, measuring and allocating water and heat costs in multi-tenanted buildings. Techem also provides heat and electricity supply services, and the financing and operation of energy supply facilities. The company provides services to approximately 11 million apartments and operates out of 150 branches in 20 countries. It employs 3,640 people.

People
Partners Group – Jürgen Diegruber (partner).
Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec – Stéphane Etroy (head of private equity).
Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan – Jo Taylor (managing director).
Techem – Frank Hyldmar (CEO).

Advisers
Acquirer – Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer (legal); EY (financial due diligence, tax); McKinsey (commercial due diligence) Pöyry (commercial due diligence).
Vendor – Deutsche Bank (M&A); JP Morgan (M&A).