Leading growth buyouts
News
Spirit Capital flying with 4x return on Brookhouse exit
17 June 2008
Spirit Capital (“Spirit” formerly AAMPE*) is pleased to announce the successful sale of specialist aerospace components company, Brookhouse Holdings Limited (“Brookhouse”) to Kaman Corporation (“Kaman”) for £43m. The sale represents a full exit for Spirit's investors and generates a return of in excess of 4x the cost of the original investment.
Spirit originally invested in Brookhouse in May 2004, supporting a buy-out of the Darwen based business. Since then Spirit has worked closely with the management team, led by Chief Executive Richard Thorley, to drive the growth of the business. Brookhouse now supplies parts into many of the major manufacturing programmes within both the civil and defence aviation sectors including the Airbus A320 and the Joint Strike Fighter. In the year to September 2007 the business generated sales of £28m. Andy Glennon led the exit on behalf of Spirit Capital.
This disposal is the latest in a series of successful recent exits for Spirit including the trade sale of Plaxton and the IPO of Styles&Wood.
Francesco Santinon, Managing Partner, Spirit Capital, commented: “The sale of Brookhouse to Kaman followed an intense 18 month process of developing the business with certain strategic buyers in mind. This delivers an outstanding result for our investors and we wish both the management team and the new owners every success in developing the business further.”
Notes
*Prior to September 2008 Spirit Capital was previously known as Aberdeen Asset Managers Private Equity/ AAMPE