KPS Capital Partners today announced that its portfolio company International Equipment Solutions (IES) has acquired CWS Industries, a manufacturer of highly-engineered attachment products. This is the fourth acquisition by IES since its formation.
CWS is a manufacturer of highly-engineered attachment products, including tire manipulators, cable reelers, grapples, buckets and various large excavator attachment products. Its customers include a global network of dealers and end-users in the mining, oil & gas, forestry and construction markets. The company employs 140 people at two facilities, located in Surrey, British Columbia and Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (www.cwsindustries.com).
Financing for the transaction was provided by a syndicate of institutional investors agented by Regiment Capital Advisors and PNC Bank.
KPS formed IES in September 2011 as a platform for investments serving the construction, agriculture, landscaping, infrastructure, recycling, demolition, mining, and energy industries. At that time, KPS announced IES’s first two acquisitions, Paladin Brands Holding, Inc. and Crenlo LLC, from Dover Corporation. In November 2011, Stephen Andrews was retained as Chief Executive Officer of IES to lead the integration of the first two acquisitions and to grow and globalize the company. As part of its globalization strategy, IES acquired Siac do Brasil, a manufacturer of cab enclosures in Brazil, in June 2012. IES employs over 2,500 people and operates 15 manufacturing facilities in the United States, Germany, and Brazil. The company is based in Oak Brook, IL (www.iesholdings.com).
“We are very proud of the progress IES has made to date. In only a brief ten months, KPS has created a truly global manufacturing company as a result of four highly synergistic acquisitions. The company has dramatically improved its profitability under our ownership and exceeded all of our expectations for growth. IES continues to capitalize on opportunities to grow its business internationally, and we believe that with each acquisition and subsequent integration, IES increases the value proposition offered to its customers,” said Raquel Palmer, a Partner at KPS.
KPS Capital Partners is the manager of the KPS Special Situations Funds, a group of private equity funds with over $2.9 billion of committed capital focused on investing in restructurings, turnarounds and other special situations. KPS has created new companies to purchase operating assets out of bankruptcy; established stand-alone entities to operate divested assets; and recapitalized highly leveraged public and private companies. The KPS investment strategy targets companies with strong franchises that are experiencing operating and financial problems. The firm is located in New York, NY (www.kpsfund.com).
“The acquisition of CWS is another important step towards the globalization and diversification of IES. We are very impressed with CWS’s rapid growth trajectory, customer base, engineering capabilities and broad portfolio of highly engineered attachment products,” said Stephen Andrews, Chief Executive Officer of IES. “This acquisition not only strategically enhances our footprint with dealers in Canada and the U.S. Pacific Northwest, but also opens up IES to a growing base of sales relationships located internationally in South America, Russia and Asia. Additionally, the acquisition enhances IES’ product portfolio to include a suite of attachments with applications in the high-growth mining, oil & gas and forestry end-markets, which are currently underserved by IES. As demonstrated with both this acquisition and the acquisition of Siac do Brasil, IES remains committed to supporting our customer’s global expansion initiatives with localized supply, technical resources, and parts and service support. IES intends to invest significant additional capital and resources into CWS to ensure the highest level of production quality and capacity for our customers. IES has made tremendous progress in our first ten months and I am very confident our future is bright.”
