HgCapital buys tax advisory business

HgCapital has acquired Nair & Co, a UK technical and administrative services business. 

The deal is the latest investment sealed by the firm’s Fund VI, a 2009 vintage closed on £1.9 billion (€2.2 billion, $2.9 billion). It follows the recent closing of Fund VII, which reached its £2 billion hard-cap last April. 

HgCapital Trust, the firm’s vehicle listed on the London Stock Exchange, is to contribute a total of £20 million alongside Hg’s institutional investors. No further financial details were disclosed for the transaction. 

Founded in 1994 in Bristol, UK, Nair & Company provides legal, accounting, tax and HR services to companies looking to expand internationally. It has offices in India, the US, Singapore, Japan and China and counts around 450 employees. 

It is the fourth buyout completed by Hg services team in the past three years. These have included the acquisition of UK laundry machine provider JLA in March 2010, as well as its investment in Dutch corporate services business ATC in November of the same year. The latter was sold for €303 million last June, allowing Hg to reap a 2.2x return on its original investment. 

Hg’s Fund VI has now returned 41 percent of invested capital to its LPs. Other successful exits by the firm in the last 12 months have included Computer Software Holdings, a UK IT business sold to Advanced Computer Software in March for £110 million, and Mercury Pharma, exited to Cinven in August 2012 on a 4x money multiple. 

Fund VI’s realisations have so far generated an aggregate 2.8x return on original cost.