US: Element Partners, a growth equity firm focused on investing in businesses providing innovative products, software and services to the energy and industrial markets, has executed a definitive agreement to sell Icynene to FFL Partners.
Established in 1986, Icynene manufactures and supplies spray foam insulation. In the past 25 years, more than 3Bnft2 of Icynene spray foam insulation has been installed in nearly 500,000 residential and commercial projects.
Ireland/US: Irish insulation and building materials manufacturer Kingspan has completed the acquisition of US firm Pactiv. The US$82m deal has been funded from Kingspan's existing cash resources.
Pactiv produces a range of extruded polystyrene (XPS) insulation products under the GreenGuard brand, which it supplies throughout the US from its manufacturing base in Virginia. Pactiv had sales of US$84m in the year to June 2014 and recorded an operating profit of US$10m in the period. The enterprise value is US$82m, of which US$72m is payable in cash on completion plus US$10m of working capital. Gross assets being acquired are US$30m.
Denmark: Rockwool is rolling out a new strategy under the management of the company's chairman of the board, Bjørn Høi Jensen, whose first decision was to replace CEO Eelco van Heel with Jens Birgersson.
Birgersson was chosen for the task due to his significant global experience. Rockwool wants to replace its present strategy, which involves aggressive investments in building plants, with a smarter global organisation and new ways of entering markets. According to Jensen, the previous strategy had not proved successful and the return on investment capital had not been impressive. The new strategy is expected to generate bigger earnings for Rockwool.
Germany: The German cartel office has started a probe into the country's producers of insulating materials due to suspicions of possible prohibited price agreements. A spokesman of the cartel office in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia revealed that there had already been a large-scale raid with the support of the police in mid-March 2014. The investigators are trying to find out whether the companies held illegal talks concerning prices and sales regions for hard-resistance foam, which is used for insulation in new buildings.
