DBAG links up with German internet provider

Listed German buyout firm Deutsche Beteiligungs (DBAG) has bought a 10 percent stake in Inexio, a German telecom business.  

DBAG made an all-equity investment of €10.6 million, €4.4 million from its balance sheet and the remaining €6.4 million from the DBAG Expansion Capital Fund, a €242 million 2010 vintage.  

The Expansion Capital Fund will be approximately 8 percent deployed following the investment, which is the second deal in the fund, a spokesperson told Private Equity International. The firm’s first acquisition from its growth capital vehicle was a €5.6 million investment in Plant Systems & Services PSS.   

Inexio, which was established in 2007, is a telecom company that provides high-speed internet access and landline telephony over a fibre-optic network in Germany. The firm particularly focuses on providing high-speed internet to small towns and villages, which represent attractive growth opportunities, according to the spokesperson. 

“In Germany there’s a big debate whether the big telecoms are too much concentrated on large cities. Only less than a third of the population lives in cities of more than hundred thousand people and politicians are claiming that all areas should have access to high speed internet because that’s important for [local] businesses,” the spokesperson said. 

Inexio, which is headquartered in Saarlouis, has approximately 1,800 business clients and approximately 20,000 private customers primarily in the German states of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland. 

As well as its Expansion Capital Fund, DBAG is also investing its DBAG Fund VI, which reached its €700 million hard-cap last August after spending just four months on the fundraising trail. DBAG has approximately €1.3 billion in assets under management.