ACON Investments Acquires Suzo-Happ Group
Search

ACON Investments Acquires Suzo-Happ Group

ACON Investments has acquired Suzo-Happ Group, a supplier of components and accessories to the gaming, amusement and industrial markets, from Pfingsten Partners. Pfingsten will maintain a minority interest in Suzo-Happ and the company will continue to be led by President and CEO James Brendel and other members of the existing management team and staff.

The Suzo-Happ Group is a supplier of components and accessories to the gaming, amusement and industrial markets. The Suzo-Happ Group was formed in 2004 with the merger of Suzo International, headquartered in The Netherlands, and Happ Controls, headquartered in Mount Prospect, IL. Add-on acquisitions included Advanced Electronic Systems in 2005, Starpoint Electrics in 2006, and Dynamics Chinatec in 2007. Today, Suzo-Happ has manufacturing, engineering, distribution and service capabilities in 8 countries globally. The company has more than 500 employees and 20,000 customers worldwide and is headquartered in Mount Prospect, IL (www.suzohapp.com).

ACON Investments manages private equity funds and special purpose partnerships in the US and Latin America. ACON pursues a theme-based investment strategy by focusing on industries and businesses at key inflection points in their development and pursues these opportunities in close partnership with established management teams. The firm has offices in Washington, Los Angeles, Mexico City and Sao Paulo (www.aconinvestments.com).

“We are excited to partner with the management of Suzo-Happ Group to build value in a business that is poised for continued growth,” said Ken Brotman, Founding Partner of ACON. “The company has demonstrated solid performance through its long-tenured relationships with its customers and has built a solid foundation, which will ensure Suzo-Happ Group continued success. Customers see value in breadth of product, distribution excellence along with global engineering and manufacturing and we see continued opportunity to expand this concept across multiple end markets and geographies.”

Pfingsten Partners invests in middle market manufacturing, distribution and business services companies. Since completing its first investment in 1991, Pfingsten Partners has acquired 83 manufacturing, distribution, and business service companies and has over $1 billion of capital under management. The firm is based in Chicago, IL and has offices in Changan, China and New Delhi, India (www.pfingstenpartners.com).

Financing for the acquisition is being provided by PNC Bank and Cerberus Business Finance. Hogan Lovells acted as legal advisor to ACON Investments and Paul Hastings acted as legal advisor to Pfingsten Partners.

To search in site, type your keyword and hit enter