High Road Capital Partners has closed on the sale of The Crown Group, a provider of coating services to companies operating in the automotive, agricultural and heavy truck markets, to publicly-traded PPG Industries.
The Crown Group provides coatings for electrocoat, powder coat, and liquid applications to the automotive, agriculture, construction, heavy truck and alternative energy industries. The company also provides assembly, warehousing, and sequencing services, as well as component finishing operations and inventory management. The Crown Group has 11 facilities in the Michigan cities of Detroit, Livonia, and Shelby Township; Asheboro, NC; Franklin, GA; East Moline, IL; Fort Wayne, IN; Greenville and Spartanburg, SC; Portland, TN; and Waterloo, IA. The Crown Group has approximately 950 employees and is headquartered near Detroit in Warren, MI (www.thecrowngrp.com).
The Crown Group has been a portfolio company of High Road Capital Partners and Charter Oak Equity since May 2013 and during the ownership term Crown nearly doubled both its facilities and employees.
“During our four-year ownership of Crown, revenue grew by more than 80 percent and EBITDA more than doubled,” said Bill Connell, a Partner at High Road. “Partnering with an exceptional management team, led by Frank Knoth, we expanded Crown’s products, services and footprint, enabling the company to become increasingly important to their blue-chip customer base. Crown’s success underscores High Road’s acumen in taking smaller niche companies to the next level.” Mr. Connell led the High Road team, supported by Bill Hobbs, Operating Partner.
The sale of Crown, which closed on October 2, 2017, marks the first exit for High Road’s second fund which closed at its hard cap of $320 million in December 2013. High Road invests in manufacturing, service, or value-added distribution businesses with revenues of $10 million to $100 million and EBITDAs of $3 million to $10 million. High Road has completed 43 transactions – 17 platform investments, 20 add-on acquisitions and six exits – since its founding in 2007. High Road is based in New York (www.highroadcap.com).
Charter Oak Equity, which co-invested in Crown alongside High Road in May 2013, invests in niche manufacturing, value-added distribution, and service companies ranging in size from $25 million to $150 million of enterprise value. Charter Oak was founded in 2006 and is based in Westport, CT (www.charteroak-equity.com).
PPG Industries, the buyer of Crown, is a Fortune 500 company and global supplier of paints, coatings, specialty materials, and fiberglass. The company has annual revenues of nearly $15 billion and is headquartered in Pittsburgh (www.ppg.com).
Houlihan Lokey (www.HL.com) was the financial advisor to Crown and Thompson Hine (www.thompsonhine.com) provided legal counsel.
© 2017 Private Equity Professional | October 4, 2017
