EQT has bought Bureau van Dijk Electronic Publishing (BvD), a business and financial publisher specialising in private company information, from UK-based Charterhouse Capital Partners.
No financial details of the transaction were disclosed, and EQT was unable to respond to a request for comment by press time.
Charterhouse acquired BvD from BC Partners for an enterprise value reported to be just under €990 million back in 2011.
BvD, headquartered in Amsterdam, was founded in 1991 and has more than 650 employees operating from 33 offices across Europe, the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region. Its global database integrates data from over 100 sources and covers more than 130 million companies, according to an EQT statement.
EQT’s growth strategy for the business is to support existing BvD management by utilising EQT’s network and experience from other TMT investments, said Kristiaan Nieuwenburg, partner at EQT.
Examples of other EQT investments in the sector include Springer SBM, a Dutch/German publisher of scientific, technical and medical journals and books, Sportradar, a supplier of live sports information, and StormGeo, software based decision support for weather sensitive operations at sea.
The acquisition is the 12th from EQT’s sixth flagship buyout fund, and highlights EQT’s “intensified” efforts to invest in the Benelux region, according to Christian Sinding, partner at EQT. The firm established a dedicated team for the region a year ago.
Closing of the transaction is expected in September 2014, subject to customary anti-trust approvals.
EQT was advised by Goldman Sachs International, Allen & Overy and Latham & Watkins. Charterhouse was advised by HSBC and Ashurst.
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