A Manchester-based team from DTE Corporate Finance advised on the sale of telecoms services business FDT to listed company May Gurney for £2.9m, rising to £3.5m over time.
FDT is a specialist provider of inspection and maintenance services for the mobile telecoms industry and highways engineering sectors. With a turnover of £5.2m and 90 employees, the Denton-based business had been acquired in 2002 by a management buyout team led by Darren Bardsley.
The business was sold as the result of a planned exit strategy and the vendors will continue to work in the enlarged company.
Norwich-based May Gurney has 3,450 employees and delivers maintenance services to the highways, rail, utilities and general infrastructure markets across the UK, mainly with public sector and regulated sector customers. The acquisition deepens May Gurney's mechanical and electrical capabilities, provides access to the telecoms marketplace and underpins the firm's existing support service portfolio.
David Sterry, chief executive of May Gurney, said: "We welcome a company whose customer-orientated culture and focus on long-term partnerships is aligned to ours. This acquisition delivers on our strategy for building the business, complements our strong and established presence in the utilities and highways maintenance markets and positions us well in the telecoms marketplace."
FDT director Darren Bardsley said: "The combined skills and resources of a larger business enable us to play a more significant role in helping our customers to effectively maintain their infrastructure assets over the coming years and exploit the true potential of this growing market. We look forward to growing the combined business and integrating our teams to great effect."
Keith Turpin, of DTE Corporate Finance, who advised FDT on the sale to May Gurney, as well as the 2002 buyout, added: "We are delighted to have helped our clients achieve a successful planned exit. We have worked with the FDT team for more than five years from acquisition to exit and this transaction demonstrates our ability to grow and realise significant shareholder value for our clients."
The DTE team included Keith Turpin, Colin Smyth and Richard Taylor and the vendors received legal advice from Andrew Page of Page & Company. Financial adviser to May Gurney was Altium, while financial due diligence was carried out by Grant Thornton and legal advice provided by Eversheds.
