Palladium Equity Partners has acquired Accupac, a provider of outsourced manufacturing and packaging for the personal care and beauty markets, from J.H. Whitney Capital Partners. J.H. Whitney acquired Accupac in September 2017 from H.I.G. Capital.
Accupac is a provider of outsourced manufacturing and packaging services to large pharmaceutical and over-the-counter (OTC) personal care product manufacturers. The company specializes in liquid topical and oral care products, including skin creams, toothpastes, moisturizing lotions, mouthwash and other personal care products, many of which require FDA approval.
All Accupac manufacturing facilities are FDA registered and cGMP (“Current Good Manufacturing Practice”) compliant. Accupac was founded in 1974 and is headquartered northwest of Philadelphia in Mainland, Pennsylvania. The company has two manufacturing facilities, one in Mainland and a 221,000 square foot facility – which began operations in October 2012 and doubled the company’s manufacturing capacity – in Lakewood, New Jersey. The company also has a warehouse facility in Lansdale, Pennsylvania.
Accupac, led by CEO Bruce Wright, has more than 600 employees and annual revenues of more than $200 million. “We are pleased to partner with Palladium in the next phase of our growth. We see significant opportunity to expand Accupac’s role in helping to build the world’s supply of personal care products, benefitting from our more than four decades of experience working with both leading brands in the industry as well as some exciting rapidly emerging brands through our innovation programs,” said Mr. Wright.
“We look forward to partnering with the Accupac team and supporting the company’s continued growth,” said Caleb Clark, a partner at Palladium. “We believe the company is uniquely positioned with opportunities to deepen its relationships with existing customers, penetrate new accounts through its unique innovation capabilities, develop new products, and drive growth in adjacent categories both organically and through M&A. We believe Accupac is a best-in-class operator in its space and we are excited to work with management to continue to drive the business.”
New York City-based Palladium invests from $50 million to $150 million of equity in companies that have $10 million to $75 million of EBITDA. Sectors of interest include consumer, services, industrials and healthcare, and Palladium specializes in investing in companies that operate in the US Hispanic market. In July 2019, Palladium held a final close of Palladium Equity Partners V LP with commitments of $1.56 billion. The firm’s earlier fund, Palladium Equity Partners IV LP, closed on $1.14 billion in 2014. Since its founding in 1997, Palladium has invested over $2 billion of capital in more than 34 platform investments and completed over 135 add-on acquisitions.
New Canaan, Connecticut
-based J.H. Whitney, the seller of Accupac, was founded in 1946 and invests in small and middle-market companies that are active in the consumer, healthcare, specialty manufacturing, and business services sectors.
The sale of Accupac is the second exit for J.H. Whitney in the past two months. In December 2019, the firm sold Confluence Outdoor, a Greenville, South Carolina-based manufacturer of kayaks, canoes, and paddleboards, to Pelican International, a portfolio company of Fonds de solidarité FTQ.
Varagon Capital Partners was the Administrative Agent, Joint Lead Arranger and Sole Bookrunner on a senior secured credit facility to support the buy of Accupac by Palladium.
Lincoln International was the financial advisor to Accupac on this transaction and Houlihan Lokey was the financial advisor to Palladium.
© 2020 Private Equity Professional | January 28, 2020
