Hogenhouck, a M&A Office from the Hague/Holland, was heading for the best year since its inception nearly a decade ago. So far was the consulting firm involved in 19 (!) transactions.
National website Consultancy.nl took a closer look at the track record of Hogenhouck and Hogenhouck co-founder Rik Stikkelbroeck and asked him for text and explanations.
In 2007 Rik Stikkelbroeck (left) and Mark Van Beusekom (right) – they met in 1999 when they worked for Participation Solutions * – decided to join forces and start Hogenhouck.
The M&A Office is mainly aimed at mid-market deals (value between € 10 million and € 100 million), including a focus on the IT sectors (managed services, hosting, business intelligence, hardware, software, services), industry, food and staffing.
Working explicitly not on hourly fees – but on limited fixed retainers and succes fee – they had a different angle, brought a different sound in the market .
The last ten years Hogenhouck has built up a strong name in the market, nearly 40% of its transactions are recurring, and became anno 2016 a M&A Office with a team of seven professionals, who help clients with a host of financial services. Hogenhouck, which is based in the Hague, services on the cutting edge of purchase, sales, Management Buy Out (MBO), valuation, Management Buy In (MBI) and financing. All services are in the sign of a transaction.
In conversation with Stikkelbroeck he admits that 2016 is the best year in the history of the still young company. “We have so far closed nineteen deals, something we are very proud of.”
So was Hogenhouck in Q1 of this year involved in the sale of Computication to Ram Mobile Data, an international IT service provider in the field of mobile and fixed data communication and entered it as purchase advisor on the acquisition of iProfs by Finalist, an open source specialist.
In april 2016 followed the conclusion of another deal in the IT market – Hogenhouck advised Infotheek Group with the sale to Altor Equity Partners, a private-equity firm from Sweden, taking a majority stake in Infotheek, with a turnover of more than € 300 million one of the larger suppliers of ICT equipment in our country. With the capital injection Infotheek is full of ambition. Thus, CEO of Infotheek Jordy Kool aims at increasing this turnover the coming years rapidly.
About Hogenhouck, CEO Jordy Kool of Infotheek is very clear in his statements “pragmatic attitude and no-nonse mentality” thats what he very much appreciates in Hogenhouck. “The lines inside Hogenhouck are short and if we need them, they are always accessible”, he added.
It was not the first time that Kool (Dutch CEO of the year in 2016) had worked with Hogenhouck. “Infotheek asked Hogenhouck to guide them in the Management Buy of Kool in Infotheek in 2009” says Stikkelbroeck. “In the course of the years the cooperation became more and more intense. Hogenhouck was involved in the acquisition of Condor IT (2011), Nimble (2012), Network2Day (2014) and the acquisition of 4Launch by 2015. “
Other transactions within the IT market Hogenhouck has been involved in 2016 are the investment of Gilde Equity Management in Impulse Info Systems (as buyer) and a number of sales transactions such as Net Ground (Managed Hosting sold to KPN) and the acquisition of iProfs (IT staffing company) by Finalist. Hogenhouck is also active in adjoining sectors such as the acquisition of PAT-Krüger – a provider of security and control systems for heavy duty equipment- ‘ by mr Coert Kleijwegt.
More recently Hogenhouck played a significant role in an investment round by Eyefreight, a supplier of Level 5 SaaS Transportation Management System (TMS) technology, and the acquisition of Lancom (Managed Services) by the Dutch investment collective BBB Invest. During latter deal Hogenhouck was responsible for the sell-side advisory, whereas the former deal it supported Eyefreight.
Over the past few months, Hogenhouck was responsible for three transactions. In October 2016 Hot ITem, a specialized Performance Improvement (BI) Advisor, announced that it had sold a controlling stake to the Hoge Dennen Capital – Hogenhouck helped the top three player in BI in the Netherlands from Amsterdam to prepare themselves for the capital injection and the conclusion of the agreement.
Together with Infotheek Group the largest transaction (revenue wise) of which Hogenhouck as a M&A advisor this year occurred, was the acquisition of Seafood Parlevliet by Cornelis Vrolijk. Cornelis Vrolijk (1500 people worldwide) acquired Seafood Parlevliet (225 employees). Hogenhouck acted on the buy side (Cornelis Vrolijk) in what happened to be the biggest fish deal of 2016.
Sourse: Consultancy.nl
