Ardian and Consilium sell Rollon

Amy King
18 November 2013

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Ardian and Consilium have sold Rollon, an Italian manufacturer of liner rails and actuators, to French GP Chequers Capital and Italian private equity firm IGI.

Consilium reaped a 42.9% IRR and 3.3x multiple on the deal.

The new owners will focus on the expansion of the firm into new markets, with a particular focus on south-east Asia.

Unicredit Corporate & Investment Banking provided financing to support the deal.

Previous funding
Ardian (then Axa Private Equity) and Consilium bought Rollon in 2010. Ardian acquired a 51.8% stake, management took a 5% share and Consilium took on a minority stake in the firm, according to unquote" data. Ardian invested via the €353m Axa Expansion II fund, with Consilium committing capital via its €150m Consilium Private Equity Fund.

The firm had an enterprise value of €48.9m at the time of the original buyout.

The transaction was leveraged at less than 50%, with the company's overall debt burden reduced after the deal. Banco Popolare was the lead arranger, with additional contributions from Meliorbanca and GE Capital.

The GPs intended to grow the company acquisitively and to expand its product range. The company bought EI More, an Italian actuator producer, in 2011.

Company
Founded in 1975 and based in Vimercate, Rollon manufactures linear rails and actuators for application in sectors including railways, aeronautics, logistics, packaging, machine tools and medical equipment.

The firm generates 80% of its revenues abroad via German, French and US subsidiaries. Sales in 2012 reached €54m.

People
Paolo Bergonzini is managing director and head of the Italian LBO small market enterprise capital team at Ardian. He worked on the deal alongside Marco Molteni and Michela Peigottu.

Stefano Iamoni is a partner at Consilium and worked on the transaction with Antonio Glorioso and Ruggero Arbues.

Jérôme Kinas, Bertrand Rabiller, Xavier Morin and Vivien Le Nestour represented Chequers Capital, with Matteo Cirla and Angelo Mastrandrea leading IGI.

Advisers
Vendors – Studio Gattai, Minoli and Partners, Stefano Catenacci, Gill Mazzoleni (Legal); Banca IMI (M&A); Lincoln, Julian Tunnicliffe (M&A); CBA Studio Legale e Tributario, Diego De Francesco, Luca Pangrazzi (Tax); KPMG, Matteo Contini, Alberto Galliani (Financial due diligence).
Equity – Simmons & Simmons, Andrea Accornero, Moira Gamba, Alessandro Elisio (Legal); Unicredit Corporate & Investment Banking, Giacomo Patrignani (M&A); PwC Transaction Services, Giovanni Tinuper, Alberto Zanatta (Financial due diligence); Nicola Broggi, Marco Vozzi (Tax); Roland Berger, Andrea Marinoni, Alberto de Monte (Commercial due diligence).