Innova invests in Polish power equipment business

Warsaw-based private equity firm Innova Capital has acquired a 70 percent stake in Pett&Pett Donako, a Polish supplier of steel components to the power equipment sector.
 
No deal terms were disclosed but the transaction value is understood to have been in excess of €20 million ($24 million). In addition, Innova Capital has also provided expansion financing of between €7 million and €20 million.
 
Pett&Pett’s existing shareholder, PIP Industrie Consulting of Germany, holds the remaining 30 percent of the company.
 

Tremendous growth rates achieved by the company to date confirm the existence of huge growth opportunities in the global high-end industrial products market for CEE companies. Andrzej Bartos, mananging director, Innova Capital

Headquartered in Wraclow, Pett&Pett produces tools, laminations, parts and components for large electrical machines, such as power plant generators and large motors. The group also provides engineering services to the power equipment industry. Founded in 1947, Pett&Pett became independent of Swedish engineering group ABB in 2000.
 
According to Innova Capital, Pett&Pett has more than quadrupled its revenues in the past five years, with €28 million reported in 2005. Around 90 percent of the company’s products are exported to Western Europe and China.
 
Andrzej Bartos, managing director of Innova Capital, said Pett&Pett is emblematic of the opportunities in both the region and the power equipment sector. “Tremendous growth rates achieved by the company to date confirm the existence of huge growth opportunities in the global high-end industrial products market for CEE companies,” he said in a statement. “The power equipment sector is undergoing a strategic shift towards increasing outsourcing and we support the company’s management strategy of being an independent component supplier to the global OEM market.”
 
Innova Capital’s other investments in the manufacturing sector include EBCC, a supplier of automotive brake caliper housings also based in Wroclaw; Ceramik Gres, a Polish ceramic tile producer; and Mediplast, a Polish plastic garden furniture manufacturer.
 
Founded in 1994 by Steve Buckley and Rob Conn, Innova Capital currently manages over $330 million (€270 million) in three funds: Poland Partners, Innova/98 and Innova/3.