MiddleGround Goes Down Under for Latest Race Winning Brands Add-On

Race Winning Brands, a portfolio company of MiddleGround Capital, has acquired Haltech, a designer, manufacturer, and distributor of automotive aftermarket engine systems used by performance racing enthusiasts.

Haltech’s products include engine control units, displays, wiring kits, tuning tools, and related accessories. The company’s products are used to control engines by monitoring driver data inputs to calculate the optimal performance output, displaying the information in an accessible manner to the driver.

Haltech is headquartered near Sydney in Wetherill Park, Australia, with a United States office in Lexington, Kentucky.

Race Winning Brands (RWB) is a manufacturer of pistons, engine blocks, cylinder heads, intake manifolds, connecting rods, crankshafts, clutches, and other engine and driveline-related components. The company sells its products to the automotive and powersports performance markets under several brands, including JE Pistons, Wiseco Performance Products, K1 Technologies, Diamond Pistons, Trend Performance, Rekluse Motor Sports, MGP Connecting Rods, ProX Racing Parts, Dart Machinery, Manley Performance Products, and Victory 1 Performance.

RWB’s customers include professional and sportsman racers, engine builders, enthusiasts, street performance racers, OEM crate engine builders, and automotive and powersports wholesale distributors. The company, led by CEO Bob Bruegging, is headquartered east of Cleveland in Mentor, Ohio, with sales and manufacturing operations throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia.

“I’m extremely excited about bringing Haltech into our family of brands – we have products that build faster, stronger engines – and Haltech builds products that allow those engines to perform at their best,” said Mr. Bruegging. “Located in Australia, this will also give us another base of operations outside the United States to complement our Canadian and European Operations. Nathan and his team are a welcome addition to our growing family.”

The buy of Haltech is the third add-on acquisition by RWB since being acquired by MiddleGround from Kinderhook Industries in December 2021 and follows the buys of PAC Racing, a Michigan-based maker of performance springs, in April 2022; and TPT Solutions, a California-based provider of rebuilt transmissions, torque converters, and valve bodies sold under the brands TransGo, RevMax and Transmission Specialties, also in April 2022.

“The Haltech team has driven remarkable above-market growth through its own product portfolio expansion, and RWB’s deep culture of product innovation and strong track record of adding and integrating new brands through acquisition set the combined platform up for success, providing customers with a one-stop-shop experience,” said John Stewart, a founding partner of MiddleGround.

MiddleGround makes control equity investments from $25 million to $65 million in North American-based business-to-business companies in the industrial and specialty distribution sectors that have enterprise values of up to $200 million. Lexington, Kentucky-based MiddleGround has over $2.4 billion of assets under management and was formed in May 2018 by former Monomoy Capital professionals John Stewart, Lauren Mulholland and Scot Duncan.

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