European buyout dealflow picks up in July

Greg Gille
03 September 2012

Tweet
Facebook
LinkedIn
Google plus
Send to

European private equity dealflow remained stable in July, with an increase in buyout activity making up for lackluster growth capital and early-stage investments, resulting in a significant value uptick.

July saw 82 deals completed across Europe, virtually on a par with the 80 transactions witnessed in the previous month, according to unquote" data. At €5.9bn overall, the combined value of those deals was up by around a quarter compared to June's €4.6bn.

Buyouts are, unsurprisingly, responsible for this value uptick, with the volume of such transactions increasing by 50% to 42 deals worth a total of €5.6bn. Charterhouse played no small part in this, divesting two businesses to fellow GPs in sizeable secondary buyouts: it first sold UK-based consultancy Wood Mackenzie to Hellman & Friedman for £1.1bn, and a few weeks later offloaded French industrial engineering firm Fives Group to AXA Private Equity in a deal thought to be worth around €850m.

On the other hand, the traditional August lull started earlier for growth capital specialists and VCs. Unquote" recorded 40 transactions in this space, down a quarter from June's 52 deals - meanwhile overall value remained rather stable at €317m, compared to €325m for the previous month. Standout expansion deals in July included EQT investing €44m in exchange for a minority stake in German sports data provider Sportradar.

Not all regions fared equally either. France, for instance, failed to impress: dealflow was nearly halved compared to June, and only the Fives deal prevented the overall amounts invested in the country to suffer the same fate. The DACH region however recorded its strongest value total in a year with €2.4bn worth of deals being completed - on par with the UK - and saw dealflow increase by 72% compared to June.