PAI Partners buys Uvesco for EUR 500m

The deal values Uvesco at around EUR 500m, according to a source close to the situation. 

The private equity firm has bought Uvesco through its PAI Mid-Market Fund (PAI MMF), which closed on EUR 920m in March this year. The fund was launched in January 2020 to complement PAI's existing large-cap strategy, and held a EUR 500m first close in October 2020. It surpassed its original EUR 700m target and EUR 800m hard-cap.

The vehicle invests in companies with enterprise values in the EUR 100-300m range that operate in the business services, consumer, healthcare and industrial sectors in Italy, Spain, Germany, France and the Benelux region. It deploys tickets of EUR 50-150m and pursues buy-and-build strategies aiming at supporting its portfolio companies' market consolidation and international expansion.

Current Uvesco shareholders, made up of a group of existing family shareholders, will retain a stake in the business.

Uvesco had revenues of EUR 954m in 2020, double the EUR 465m the business was posting back in 2008. It has 277 convenience stores predominantly in the North of Spain and around Madrid. PAI said its offering includes a significant fresh product component that is locally sourced.

Uvesco operates under two brands: BM Supermercados, which has 249 stores, and Super Amara, which has eight. The 20 remaining are franchises operating under the BM Shop brand.

It also has five logistics platforms made up of two central distribution platforms and three fresh product distribution platforms.

PAI said the business will look to grow organically with new stores and franchises, and through M&A with further consolidation of the fragmented Spanish retail market.

Managing director Jose Ramon Fernandez de Barrena told Expansion at the beginning of 2020 that the group was struggling to grow in Madrid due to constraints on available space. 

PAI had now made five investments under the PAI MMF fund. The others are French orthopedic prosthese market provider Amplitude Surgical; Spanish fish-based convenience food provider Angulas Aguinaga; pan-European flower and gift platform MyFlower; and Italian integrated opening solutions player Scrigno. 

Company 
Uveso was founded in 1993 from the merger of two family owned businesses in the FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) sector in the Basque region. It entered Madrid in 2017. 

People
PAI Partners - Mateo Pániker Rumeu (founding partner).
Uvesco - José Ramón Fernández de Barrena (CEO).

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• Topics
• Buyouts
• Consumer
• Southern Europe
• PAI Partners