Norvestor VI, L.P. (“Norvestor”) and minority shareholders have sold ABAX Holding AS (“ABAX”),an international market leader within connected vehicle telematics and tracking systems, to Investcorp, a leading global private equity firm with considerable experience from the telematics industry, for an enterprise value of NOK 1.8 billion.

Since Norvestor invested in ABAX in September 2012, the Company has achieved significant growth, both organically and through add-on acquisitions.

Under Norvestor’s ownership ABAX has solidified its Nordic market leading position and become a substantial Northern European player within electronic trip logs and the wider vehicle telematics market. ABAX has secured attractive footholds in the UK, Netherlands and Poland and recently also China for further geographical growth.

During Norvestor’s ownership, ABAX has completed seven add-on  acquisitions and established operations in five new countries, resulting in a revenue increase from NOK 157 million in 2012 to NOK 471 million in 2016, representing an annual revenue growth of more than 30%. The customer base has grown from c. 6,000 to c. 26,000, and the subscription portfolio has grown from c.40,000 to almost 200,000. The ABAX organization has also grown significantly, from 85 to 350 employees. ”

Norvestor has been an important partner for ABAX. They have helped us professionalize the company and focus our strategy. During their ownership, they have among others supported us to conduct add-on acquisitions, establish operations outside the Nordics, and enabled us to position the company for further growth within the world’s vehicle telematics market.”, says Petter Quinsgaard , CEO of ABAX.“

Norvestor has been a fantastic team player. When they invested in 2012 they showed that they believed in our potential and our vision. They have supported us all the way, and they have helped us develop our organization and our high-performance culture. We now have more than 350 employees of which almost 100 of them are shareholders who have all had a fantastic journey.”,says Bjørn Erik Helgeland, COO of ABAX.“

To succeed in becoming a European leader with global potential within a highly competitive area you need to be outstanding both in product development and in sales. Petter, Bjørn Erik and their team have managed to excel in both these areas through building a culture which can serve as a benchmark for organizations aspiring to be at the top in a digitized future.

It is a pleasure to handover to a new main owner who has the knowledge and the capabilities to support the further growth of ABAX. We are confident that ABAX has what it takes to continue its success and help businesses become more effective by digitizing and automate work processes”, says Henning, old Partner in Norvestor.

The money will go to the development and marketing of the marketplace.

Wood Stock Exchange wants to make it easier for buyers and sellers of wood to find each other. Today there is no structured way to trade the timber without the seller often turn to established contacts and competitive bidding is not always sales among buyers.

This would change the Timber Exchange and has therefore built a digital marketplace to handle the timber business in a simple and transparent way. On www.virkesborsen.se to forest owners completely free easily and comparing quotes from various forestry companies to ensure the profitability of forestry.

– It is good for the seller, who can get better prices by reaching more potential customers. But it is also good for the buyer, who gets a better overview of what is available and can streamline their work significantly, says Erik Ydrén, Investment Manager at Almi Invest. The forest industry is currently being digitized, so the company is very timely.

This is the first digital marketplace for wood in Sweden. The vision is a more transparent and accessible timber market where all Swedish forest owners can make wise and business decisions in the sale of timber. A digital marketplace also provides timber buyers the opportunity to streamline their work and gain access to the timber.

– Wood Stock Exchange plays an important role in the interface between forest owners who want to do good business and timber buyers faced increasingly tough competition for wood, says Adam Aljaraidah, CEO and co-founder of Wood Stock Exchange. With Almi Invest and Olof Hallrup as investors, we both capital and expertise is of great importance for our development. Now we have all the prerequisites to make the Swedish timber market more transparent and accessible to all players. A more efficient timber market to enable new products from the forest that can replace fossil-based raw materials.

In connection with the investment goes Sven Wird, many years of technical director at Holmen and Board of Sveaskog, in as Chairman of the Timber Exchange

Ratos has signed an agreement to divest all of its shares in its subsidiary Nebula – Finland’s leading provider of cloud services to small and medium-sized companies – to Telia Company for EUR 165m (enterprise value). The divestment generates a net exit gain of approximately SEK 500m, an average annual return (IRR) of approximately 37% and a money multiple of 3.3x.

Nebula is a market leading provider of cloud services, managed services, and network services to small and medium-sized enterprises in the Finnish market. The company has approximately 44,000 customers, 90% subscription-based recurring revenue, and industry-leading profitability.

During Ratos’s four years as an active owner of Nebula the company has implemented a number of value-generating strategic initiatives. Two synergistic add-on acquisitions have reinforced its market-leading position among Finnish SMEs. Investments have been made in the company’s product development and its sales & marketing capabilities. The customer base has grown by more than 30% during Ratos’s ownership and the number of employees from 110 to 145. The annual growth rate has been approximately 12%^*) since the acquisition in 2013, with sales amounting to EUR 35.2m and an EBITA of EUR 10.6m per rolling 12 months as of 31 March 2017.

“Together with Nebula’s management and our co-investors Rite Ventures, we have focused on continued growth and profitability. Through strategic measures and added resources, we have strengthened the company’s market position. Improved customer offerings have secured strong customer relationships and high customer satisfaction. Nebula is a well-run company positioned for further growth. Following our discussions with Telia Company, which is a logical buyer, we have arrived at a purchase price that takes Nebula’s position and prospects into account. On this basis, we have agreed to sell and believe the time is right to hand over to a new owner. We are convinced that Nebula and Telia Company complement each other well and can benefit from each other’s respective strengths,” says Johan Rydmark, Investment Director at Ratos.

The selling price for 100% of the shares (equity value) amounts to EUR 110m and the enterprise value to EUR 165m. Ratos’s share of the equity value is approximately EUR 78m and the net exit gain totals approximately SEK 500m, calculated on the book value of Ratos’s holding in Nebula at 31 March 2017. Average annual return (IRR) amounts to approximately 37%. Ratos’s holding in Nebula is 73%. The transaction is expected to be completed during the third quarter and is subject to customary merger control filings.

^*) The annual growth rate includes the acquisition of Sigmatic.

Almi Invest exits from Dapresy and sells its share to Verdane Capital
Press Release • May 17, 2017 16:00 CEST
SaaS company Dapresy has developed its own analytical tool for market research where the results are presented in the form of infographic.

Almi Invest will exit from Dapresy and sells its share to the Nordic Private Equity Fund Verdane Capital IX. Norrköpingsbolaget Dapresy is a global supplier of a software platform for information visualization of market research data. The company has customers around the world and a significant proportion of the world’s larger companies use Dapresy. In connection with Almi Invest’s divestment, Verdane enters into the new main owner and investor in Dapresy.

Dapresy was founded in 2003 and is a spin-off company from Hermelin Research. In 2010, Dapresy Pro launched on a global market with customers in more than 25 countries. Customers are found in all segments with a focus on larger information-intensive companies that need to communicate market research data to larger organizations. Dapresy has transformed a mature market by allowing modern-time collaborators at all levels of a company to review market research data, tailored individually to the needs of the individual employee, with the aim of supporting more and better business decisions.

-Almi Invest entered the first external investor in 2011. Dapresy has grown steadily and had an annual revenue increase of about 30%. The success of the company is that the team has combined technical excellence with a strong commercial drive on the market side, which made them succeed in gaining global players as loyal customers. With an exit of 5 times invested capital, it enables multiple investments in promising tech startups and contributes to long-term investment activities, says Björn Persson Fund Manager Almi Invest

In 2016, Dapresy had sales of more than 50 million and now has 60 employees. In addition to the head office in Norrköping, Dapresy is represented with local offices in the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Germany and Bosnia. Through partner, the company is represented in Australia and New Zealand.

-Almi Invest and Almi Corporate Partners have been crucial to taking Dapresy where we are today. With Almi Invest as investor and Björn Persson as board member of Dapresy, the company has been able to accelerate growth, expand internationally and create a basic structure for profitable sustained growth. With Verdane as a new strong investor, we are aiming for continued strong growth in Sweden and in our international core markets, “said Torbjörn Andersson, CEO of Dapresy

Contact:

Torbjörn Andersson, CEO, Dapresy, tel: +46 (0) 709 29 94 13, torbjorn.andersson@dapresy.com

Björn Persson, Fund Manager, Almi Invest, tel: + 46 070-2074125, bjorn.persson@almiinvest.se

Maria Kessling, Head of Communications, Almi Invest, tel +46 76-880 88 10 maria.kessling@almiinvest.se

About Almi Invest

Almi Invest is Sweden’s most active investor in startups. We make investments throughout the country through 8 regional venture capital companies and a national venture capital company in GreenTech. Almi Invest manages approximately SEK 3 billion and has since invested approximately 600 startups. Our best holdings have been acquired by Google, Microsoft, Qlik and Apple, for example, or listed on different stock exchanges. Almi Invest is a venture capital company within the Almi Group.

About Dapresy

Dapresy provides a highly visual data reporting software for market research and customer experience management. Market research agency and enterprise professionals in more than 25 countries are using Dapresy Pro to deploy visually engaging dashboards to clearly communicate complex data from markets, users and customers. The company’s unique dynamic dashboards are individually tailored, deploying the right data to the right people at the right time. For marketers looking to move beyond PowerPoint and Excel, Dapresy is the faster and far more effective way to easily present market research and customer experience information from multiple sources in a way that improves decision making. Founded in 2003, Dapresy has a headquarters in Sweden with a North American headquarters in Portsmouth, NH. The firm has several other client services offices around the globe. www.dapresy.com

About Verdane

Verdane funds help ambitious companies in software, e-commerce, energy and high technology industry with flexible capital for growth. The funds can invest either in individual companies or in several at the same time, so-called portfolio transactions. The latest fund, Verdane Capital IX, has 3 billion kronor to invest in fast-growing companies. Verdane Capital Advisors has 25 employees in offices in Stockholm, Oslo and Helsinki. For more information: www.verdanecapital.com.

Rabobank and Signicat are entering the Dutch identity market together by providing digital services to businesses, supporting them in servicing their clients.

Read the full story on signicat.com or read about it in Norwegian newspaper Adressa.

This joint Digital Identity Service Provider (DISP) offers a range of online login, identity, signature and archiving solutions under the banner of Rabo eBusiness. It provides optimal convenience for a range of businesses, including insurance, energy and leasing companies as well as other financial services providers. It simplifies and improves the digital transformation they are under pressure to achieve.

Rabo eBusiness helps businesses to shape their online services in an easier, more reliable and efficient way to achieve higher online conversion. Consumers can log onto the merchant’s website using one of the identity services provided by Rabo eBusiness and can then, for example, sign a contract online. The platform is easy to integrate into the existing business processes using API technology.

Rabobank will initially focus on five customer groups: energy, telecom and insurance companies, healthcare institutions and financial services providers. Rabo eBusiness services will make it easy for them to enable functions such as onboarding new customers, signing contracts digitally and offering a dashboard for invoices or expense claims.
The market for DISPs opened on 1st April 2017 within the framework of iDIN.

Alexander Zwart, responsible for Online Channels & Access at Rabobank, explains that Rabobank already has a good starting position, having: ‘Advisory skills, a large market share in the business market, operational services and a mature salesforce. In order to be able to offer technology and a high-quality and safe range of products, we have opted not to develop it ourselves, but instead to collaborate with a well-established strategic player. Signicat has a proven Digital Identity Service platform that is considered leading in the Nordics, a mature digital identity market.’

Signicat in turn wants to expand its presence in the Dutch market. Gunnar Nordseth, Chief Executive Officer of Signicat: ‘We have been operating for some time as an identity service provider in the Nordics and are currently expanding into other parts of Europe. The Netherlands is a strategically important market for us and a European hub that has great potential for digital identity, signature and archiving services. Collaborating with an innovative bank such as Rabobank gives us the opportunity to fulfil our ambition.’

The platform has been designed to grow in tandem with market demands and can consequently be expanded to include additional services. This lays the foundation for achieving Rabobank’s strategic ambition to help its customers with the digitisation of their services.

Epiris is pleased to announce that its portfolio company AXIO Group (“AXIO”) has agreed the sale of TechInsights, a leading intellectual property and technology services provider, to Oakley Capital. The sale, which is expected to complete in the next two weeks, is the seventh and final major realisation from AXIO’s portfolio and will conclude what has been an exceptional investment for Epiris and its investors.

Based on today’s exchange rates, Electra Private Equity PLC (“Electra”) will receive proceeds from AXIO of £26 million. The sale will increase the total cash proceeds received by Electra from its investment in AXIO to £455 million, equivalent to 5.0x original cost, and an IRR of 76%.

Based in Ottawa, Canada, TechInsights is the global leader in intellectual property consulting, patent brokerage and technical reverse engineering. TechInsights helps patent owners maximize the value of their patents through portfolio assessment, advising on strategic options, licensing and litigation support. In 2016 the business was combined with Chipworks, the leader in the intellectual property and technology services market, creating the clear global leader in advanced technology intelligence and technology founded patent advisory services.

Alex Cooper-Evans, Partner at Epiris, said:

“We are delighted to have agreed the final sale from the AXIO group of companies which will conclude what has been an outstanding investment for our investors, delivering an unlevered return of 5x cost and an IRR of 76%.

“The AXIO investment is a terrific example of the Epiris strategy at work. We bought a complex group of assets before transforming them with a programme of strategic and operational focus as well as investment in organic and M&A-led growth. This created a portfolio of high-performance growth businesses which has proven to be extremely attractive to trade and financial buyers alike.

“Henry Elkington and the rest of the AXIO management team have done an exceptional job in delivering this return and we look forward to finding another opportunity to work together.”

Henry Elkington, CEO of AXIO Group, said:

“We are delighted to have brought this investment to a successful conclusion. I speak for the whole management team in saying that this outcome would not have been possible without Epiris, whose vision and support have been invaluable.”

Alex Fortescue and Alex Cooper-Evans are responsible for the investment in AXIO Group.

Epiris refers to Epiris Managers LLP acting on behalf of its clients, including Electra Private Equity PLC.

The European online printing market is growing and will continue to win significant market share from offline competitors in the years to come. Rotterdam-based Helloprint is a key player in the industry and one of Europe’s fastest growing online platforms, offering more than 2,000 products via its network of over 100 international printers. To increasingly benefit from the positive market development, Helloprint has entered into a long-term partnership with Bregal Unternehmerkapital and Project A, the Berlin-based venture capital investor, who are investing several million euros to acquire a minority stake in Helloprint via their holding Onlineprinters.

This investment will provide Helloprint with additional financial and strategic resources to continue accelerating its growth and to expand its platform business more rapidly. Currently, Helloprint provides printed products to more than 150,000 customers in the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Italy, the UK, Spain, Germany and Ireland.

Helloprint will use the injection of capital to enhance its IT systems, grow its team and implement new customer acquisition efforts. Thanks to the company’s service-oriented platform model, Helloprint is able to grow without major capex investments. The new funding follows a seed financing round providing start-up capital and several million euros in series A financing by private investors.

Bregal is excited to have found another strong partner in a very promising market and is looking forward to actively supporting Helloprint in its growth ambitions.

Press contact:

IRA WÜLFING KOMMUNIKATION
Dr. Reinhard Saller
Phone: +49 89 2000 30-30
bregal@wuelfing-kommunikation.de