OpenGate Capital has acquired Duraco Specialty Tapes from UK-based Essentra plc.

Duraco is a business-to-business manufacturer of specialty tapes which are used in point-of-purchase displays, appliances, transit packaging, construction, signage, and HVAC applications. Duraco’s application-specific tapes are considered alternatives to mechanical fasteners and traditional glues and offer better adhesion and efficiencies in customer’s assembly operations.

Many of the company’s customers have been with Duraco for more than 40 years. Duraco has more than 133 employees and is headquartered near Chicago in Forest Park, IL with three service centers in Los Angeles, CA; Edison, NJ; and Houston, TX (www.essentraspecialtytapes.com).

“The acquisition of Duraco from Essentra is a unique opportunity within the specialty tapes market,” said Andrew Nikou, OpenGate’s founder and CEO. “It is a leading player in a fragmented industry and shows potential to be a platform for future roll-up acquisitions. We pride ourselves in our ability to partner with corporations divesting non-core assets, and we intend to take the upsides we’ve identified in the business to drive its full optimization.”

OpenGate acquires non-core divisions of larger corporations that have revenues from $50 million to $1 billion. The EBITDA of the divisions can be negative, break-even, or positive. The firm was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Los Angeles with an additional office in Paris (www.opengatecapital.com).

Joshua Adams, OpenGate’s managing director of business development, sourced this acquisition with Matthias Gundlach and Paul Bridwell, both managing directors in the firm’s Los Angeles office, negotiating and overseeing the investment.

Essentra (LSE: ESNT) is a supplier of plastic and fiber products with annual revenues of approximately $1.3 billion. The company is headquartered northeast of London in Milton Keynes, UK (www.essentra.com).

© 2019 Private Equity Professional | July 2, 2019

  FS, specialty tapes