Cinven's PizzaExpress bought by Hony

Ellie Pullen
14 July 2014

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Chinese firm Hony Capital has acquired PizzaExpress, the UK restaurant chain that was part of Cinven-owned Gondola Holdings, for around ТЃ900m, or 10x EBITDA.

unquote" reported last month that Cinven was exploring a sale of the casual dining chain for up to £1bn.

Cinven acquired Gondola in December 2006. The £900m take-private included a £290m equity ticket supplied from Cinven's fourth fund, according to unquote" data, and a £610m debt package provided by Bank of Scotland.

The GP sold Byron, a UK high-end burger chain that was also part of Gondola, to Hutton Collins Partners in October last year for £100m.

Cinven will begin exploring potential sales of the two remaining casual dining brands under Gondola: Zizzi and Ask Italian.

Previous funding
TDR Capital and Capricorn Ventures International took PizzaExpress private in July 2003 for £278m. They then floated the business in January 2005 on the London Stock Exchange.

Prior to that, it was owned by Luke Johnson between 1992 and 1999. Johnson floated the business at 40 pence per share; by the time he stepped down as chairman in 1999 shares were trading at 800 pence apiece and the company had a market cap of £500m.

In 2010, Cinven acquired the international rights to PizzaExpress from TDR and Capricorn, which had retained the international division when they floated the business.

Company
Founded in 1965 and headquartered in London, PizzaExpress operates 436 sites across the UK and 68 sites in international markets, 22 of which are located in China (with 12 in Hong Kong, nine in Shanghai and one in Beijing).

According to Cinven, since its take-private of the business in 2006, PizzaExpress has expanded by 130 restaurants in the UK and added around 2,500 jobs.

The company generated revenues of £369.4m in 2013, as well as an EBITDA of £90m. It employs 9,300 staff.

People
Richard Hodgson is the CEO of PizzaExpress; he was appointed in April 2013 and will remain at the helm following Hony's acquisition. The rest of the existing management team will also remain in place.