Dzeta sells 51% My Media stake in €50m OBO

José Rojo
29 October 2015

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French buyout GP Dzeta Conseil has sold its 51% stake in Parisian media agency My Media back to the founders, which will fully control the business post-transaction.

My Media's three founders – Anthony Ravau, David Ringrave and Benjamin Séguillon – financed the takeover via a €20m facility with equity warrants provided by alternative lender Euromezzanine. In addition, the deal is understood to have featured a €12m loan from the company's historical lenders CIC Est, Neuflize OBC and Caisse d'Epargne.

Dzeta's exit comes more than two years after it invested alongside My Media's managers to acquire a controlling stake in the business. The MBO was sealed in March 2013, two years after the company mandated investment bank Bryan Garnier to seek a financial partner.

My Media's enterprise value has reportedly shot up from €20m to €50m since then, with gross profits rising by 42% in the period. According to the business, this has been accomplished by organic growth, as new clients such as Zalando, Trivago and Made.com were secured and existing ones increased their advertising budget.

In addition, the company has grown by adding on players from its segment such as Libre Echange and local media space specialist Geovista. This has been compounded by the development of its own advertising agency Eggs, which was created in 2009 and has since added Direct Energy, Lelynx and Pimkie to its client base.

Company
Founded in 2005, My Media is a media agency specialising in the purchase of advertising space. In addition, the business carries out advertising work via the Eggs brand and offers natural indexing and local media space purchase services through its Search Foresight and Geovista units. Headquartered in Levallois-Perret, near Paris, the company employs 80 professionals.

People
Euromezzanine's work on the deal was led by associate director Charles Mercier. Anthony Ravau founded My Media and is the company's current CEO.

Advisers
Equity – Oderis Consulting, Jean-Albert Bureau (Financial due diligence); Joffe & Associés, Aymeric Dégremont (Legal); Mayer Brown, Emily Pennec, François-Régis Gonon, Ségolène Dufetel (Legal).
Vendor – Bryan Garnier & Co, Thibaut de Smedt, Guillaume du Repaire (Corporate finance); DLA Piper, Emmanuel El Medioni (Legal).