London, July 6th 2017 – Ardian, the independent private investment company, today announced the arrangement of a Unitranche financing facility to refinance Bellrock, a leading facilities management and property services provider. The facility will also fund Bellrock’s acquisition of Profile Consultancy Limited (“Profile”), and includes a committed debt facility to further support Bellrock’s expansion plans.
Bellrock was formed in 2000 as SGP Property Services. It provides facilities and property management, and other associated services, to a large blue chip customer base spread across a broad range of sectors and disciplines, including education, healthcare, and retail & leisure, in both the public and private sectors. Backed by Lyceum since 2013, the company has been a leading player in the technology-enabled service management space.
Profile, jointly based in Bedford and York, is the UK’s leading service charge expert, and currently manages £250 million service charges per annum on behalf of its corporate clients in the retail and leisure sector. Profile’s services add to the corporate occupier offering provided by Bellrock, following last year’s acquisition of Property Solutions. Bellrock is now the leading independent provider of service charge management to corporate occupiers in the UK, making it the partner of choice for all tenant service charge requirements.
Following five successful add-on acquisitions in 2016, completed together with investor Lyceum Capital, this latest acquisition is the single biggest investment to reinforce Bellrock’s technology-driven facilities management and property management service offering. Bellrock’s acquisition strategy will be further supported in the future by Ardian through committed and uncommitted financing facilities.
Olivier Berment, Co-Head of Ardian Private Debt and Managing Director, said: “Bellrock is an innovator in its sector with its focus on tech-enabled services to support the property management needs of its commercial customers. Add-on acquisitions will continue to form a key part of Bellrock’s growth strategy, so we are excited to offer flexible financing to enable this, and help the team realise its ambitious growth plans.”
David Smith, CEO, Bellrock, added: “Profile is a highly skilled outfit and a perfect fit for Bellrock, which now has a reputation as the leading tech-enabled facilities management and property services provider in the UK. We are delighted to bring Ardian on board as a new partner to help drive our ambitious growth strategy, as we continue our organic expansion as well as acquiring additional businesses that further complement our product suite.”
Adam Lewis, Investment Director at Lyceum Capital, added: “The last 12 months have been transformational for Bellrock. During this time David and the team have successfully created a market leader in property and facilities management. We continue to see huge potential for the business.”
ABOUT BELLROCK
Founded in 2000, Bellrock supplies a range of managed facilities and property services under long-term contracts to a blue chip client-base spanning the healthcare, education, corporate and retail sectors. The company uses its own facilities management technology platform to plan, report and analyse trends, which helps its customers operate and manage their estates more efficiently. The Company oversees or delivers c.1million facilities management jobs per annum.
www.bellrock.fm
ABOUT ARDIAN
Ardian, founded in 1996 and led by Dominique Senequier, is an independent private investment company with assets of US$62 billion managed or advised in Europe, North America and Asia. The company, which is majority-owned by its employees, keeps entrepreneurship at its heart and delivers investment performance to its global investors while fuelling growth in economies across the world. Ardian’s investment process embodies three values: excellence, loyalty and entrepreneurship.
Ardian maintains a truly global network, with more than 460 employees working through twelve offices in Beijing, Frankfurt, Jersey, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Milan, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Singapore and Zurich. The company offers its 580 investors a diversified choice of funds covering the full range of asset classes, including Ardian Funds of Funds (primary, early secondary and secondary), Ardian Private Debt, Ardian North America Direct Buyout, Direct Funds (Ardian Mid Cap Buyout, Ardian Expansion, Ardian Growth, Ardian Co-Investment), Ardian Infrastructure, Ardian Real Estate and customized mandate solutions with Ardian Mandates.
www.ardian.com