Express celebrates private equity funding injection

Express Engineering, has gained a fresh capital injection from mid-market private equity investor LDC to accelerate its expansion. The deal backs the management team of Express, which is led by founder and chairman Chris Thompson and managing director Nigel Davison.

The management team plans to grow the business and capitalise on growth in the oil and gas sector. LDC has taken a minority equity stake in the business as part of the transaction. Express supplies machined components and products into the oil and gas market.

The business, based in Gateshead, has a subsidiary called Petrotec in Sao Paulo, Brazil and recently acquired the trade and assets of the Stokesley-based engineering business Burdon.

For the financial year ending March 2013, the combined group recorded revenues of around £30m, which represents an almost three-fold increase since 2010.

John Garner, director and head of LDC in Yorkshire and the North East, who was supported on the transaction by investment director Dale Alderson, said: “Our investment will allow Express to further broaden its proposition and bring much needed capacity into the market.”

Nigel Davison, the managing director at Express, said: “LDC is the perfect partner to help deliver our long-term growth objectives. Our business has grown rapidly in recent years to become one of the leading players in the precision engineering market.”

So far in 2013, LDC’s Yorkshire and North East team has backed the buyout of NRS, the former healthcare division of listed multi-channel retailer Findel.

The team has also exited its investments in temporary access systems provider EVE, which was acquired by Ashtead Group, and technology services provider Trustmarque through a £43m secondary MBO backed by Dunedin.

Express and its management team were advised by Newcastle-based PwC partner Paul Mankin and Martin Hulls of Ward Hadaway. Martin Jenkins, Dan Renton, Charlie Barker and Will Johnson from Deloitte’s corporate finance team along with Anil Gupta from Deloitte’s debt advisory team, advised LDC.

Legal advice was provided by Jonathan Jones of Squire Sanders.

A package of senior debt facilities was provided by Express’ long-term banking partner Lloyds Bank.

The deal was led by director Jimmy Williamson from Lloyds Bank’s Acquisition Finance team and Commercial Banking’s head of mid markets for the North East and North Cumbria, Mike Mullaney.