TDR Capital agreed to buy the U.K. infrastructure-services group, built through 18 add-on acquisitions. Neither side disclosed terms.
Private Markets · FinancialMarkets.com · · Tickers: None (private)
Triton Partners has agreed to sell OCU Group to TDR Capital, handing one private equity owner's buy-and-build platform to another.
The deal, announced Monday, is subject to regulatory approvals, and the two firms kept the terms private.
The operating numbers
OCU, an infrastructure-services group, generated revenue of £1.2 billion in its fiscal year ended . That is about four times the £295 million it reported for the year ended April 2022, the year Triton bought it. The company has an order book of more than £4 billion.
The £1.2 billion is annual revenue, not the value of the transaction.
How the growth was built
OCU made 18 add-on acquisitions under Triton's ownership. It now employs more than 2,500 people directly and has a total workforce of about 5,500 across the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and India.
That strategy, buying smaller companies in a fragmented sector and folding them into a larger platform, is one of private equity's standard ways to build value. It also raises the question every buyer of such a platform has to answer: how much of the growth came from acquisitions, and how much the combined business can generate on its own.
Sponsor to sponsor
The sale passes OCU from one private equity firm to another rather than to a corporate buyer or the public market. A secondary buyout of this kind gives Triton's investors cash after a holding period of about four years. For TDR, the order book above £4 billion gives visibility into future revenue.
Lazard and White & Case advised Triton.
What to watch
Regulatory approvals and any disclosure of terms through financing documents are the next markers. If TDR finances the purchase with debt, a lender presentation or bond offering could reveal the valuation the two firms agreed.