Berlin / Frankfurt am Main, September 1, 2021 – Ardian, a world leading private investment house, announces today that it is providing additional growth capital to Berlin Brands Group (“BBG”), a global e-commerce company based in Berlin, through its fifth generation of Expansion Funds. Over the course of the transaction, Ardian will once again become a minority shareholder in BBG and support the company during its next growth phase alongside majority shareholder and CEO Peter Chaljawski, as well as BBG’s new and second largest shareholder, Bain Capital.
Berlin Brands Group is a pioneer in direct-to-consumer (D2C) brand marketing. The multi-brand company sells a range of over 3,700 products under 34 own brands and via 100 online channels across 28 countries. The brands encompass the household appliances, consumer electronics, gardening and fitness equipment segments, including Klarstein (klarstein.de), auna (auna.de), blumfeldt (blumfeldt.de) and Capital Sports (capitalsports.de).
As a key part of its next growth phase, BBG launched a comprehensive M&A roll-up strategy in 2020 focusing on acquiring, integrating and scaling e-commerce brands across its platform. Ardian supported the group’s management in implementing this strategy and now plans to further contribute to establishing BBG as the leading global D2C consolidator.
Ardian was already invested in BBG via its third generation of Expansion Funds from July 2015 to September 2021.
“We have benefitted greatly from Ardian’s expertise as a reliable investment partner in recent years. We are therefore thrilled that Ardian will also accompany us during our next growth phase.” PETER CHALJAWSKI, Founder and CEO of BBG
“BBG continues to show significant growth potential and we fully support the company’s strategy, as well its excellent management team led by Peter Chaljawski. We look forward to continue our successful partnership.” MARC ABADIR, Managing Director in Ardian’s German Expansion Team
ABOUT ARDIAN
Ardian is a world-leading private investment house with assets of US$120bn managed or advised in Europe, the Americas and Asia. The company is majority-owned by its employees. It keeps entrepreneurship at its heart and focuses on delivering excellent investment performance to its global investor base. Through its commitment to shared outcomes for all stakeholders, Ardian’s activities fuel individual, corporate and economic growth around the world. Holding close its core values of excellence, loyalty and entrepreneurship, Ardian maintains a truly global network, with more than 800 employees working from fifteen offices across Europe (Frankfurt, Jersey, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Milan, Paris and Zurich), the Americas (New York, San Francisco and Santiago) and Asia (Beijing, Singapore, Tokyo and Seoul). It manages funds on behalf of more than 1,200 clients through five pillars of investment expertise: Fund of Funds, Direct Funds, Infrastructure, Real Estate and Private Debt.
ABOUT BERLIN BRANDS GROUP
Berlin Brands Group (BBG) is a global e-commerce company and one of the pioneers in the direct-to-consumer business. The Berlin-based hidden champion currently sells over 3,700 every day and trendy products across 34 of its own e-commerce brands. The goal: to become one of the world’s leading
e-commerce companies with a ‘global house of digital brands’.
Press contact
ARDIAN – CHARLES BARKER CORPORATE COMMUNICATIONS
Peter Steiner
ardian@charlesbarker.de Tel: +49 69 79409027
