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The Wire

Private equity deal news and insights from the London newsroom

Jan 21, 2025

 

Leon Capital backs UK retrofitter; Equistone portcos sign add-ons; CEOs bullish on dealmaking, EY finds

Morning all, Craig McGlashan here with the Europe Wire from the London newsroom.

 

Retrofitting the UK’s housing stock to be more energy efficient is one of the biggest tasks facing the country’s net-zero plans. Private equity is playing in the sector, with Leon Capital this morning announcing a majority stake in a business that provides home energy efficiency and retrofit services.

 

Switching to add-ons, we’ve got deals involving a pair of Equistone portfolio companies. One is in the outdoor advertising industry and the other in cloud-transformation.

 

Next, we look at what EY’s latest CEO Outlook Pulse Survey suggests could be on the dealmaking horizon, before I finish with a call-out for coffee and chats with anyone attending the IPEM conference in Cannes next week.

 

Retrofitting

Leon Capital this morning announced it was taking a majority stake in Domna, a company that provides home energy efficiency and retrofit services.

 

Read the premium version of the Wire for details including the investment size and analysis on the wider sector.

 

Great outdoors

Switching from at-home to outdoors, where Equistone Partners Europe has been following a buy-and-build strategy of its own.

 

The private equity firm’s portfolio company Talon has acquired Out of Home Masters, which it says is the largest out-of-home media specialist in the Netherlands. Out-of-home media refers to advertising in outdoor spaces such as billboards.

 

Read more about the strategy in the premium version of the Wire.

 

Clouding up

It’s a busy morning in add-ons for Equistone. Its portfolio company TimeToAct Group, a provider of IT services for upper medium-sized companies, corporations and public institutions, is buying beBold, an independent consulting boutique for cloud-transformation projects based in Hamburg.

 

Carve-outs in

A large majority of sources we’ve spoken to about the outlook for 2025 expect it to be a big one for dealmaking – and so do many of the CEOs who could be buying from or selling to private equity this year, according to EY’s latest CEO Outlook Pulse Survey, released today.

 

Find out more, including how the findings tally with some of our Outlook articles, in the premium version of the Wire.

 

Meet up

Finally, I’m going to be at the IPEM conference in Cannes next week. Would love to chat to any readers in attendance – drop me a note at [email protected] and we’ll get something in the diary.

 

That’s all from me today. Obey Martin Manayiti will be on US duty later today and I’ll be back with you from Europe tomorrow.

 

Cheers,

Craig

 

Read the full Wire commentary on PE Hub ...

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Deals

> Equistone-backed Timetoact adds on BeBOLD More...
> Equistone-backed Talon buys Out of Home Masters More...
> Leon Capital takes majority stake in home energy efficiency biz Domna More...
> Bridgepoint completes acquisition of Eckoh More...
> TDR Capital to buy majority stake in CorpAcq More...
> Bain Capital-backed Kantar Group proposes $1bn sale of Kantar Media More...
People
> Foresight appoints Olly Cox as senior investment manager More...
> Palatine announces trio of promotions More...
> Bain Capital names Ivano Sessa as co-head of private equity in Europe More...

They said it

“OOH Masters provides access to the highly attractive Dutch OOH market, which benefits from high programmatic adoption and provides a bridgehead for Talon to expand into the broader Benelux region.”

— Tristan Manuel, director, Equistone

 

Today's letter was prepared by Craig McGlashan

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