Souter Investments, the private equity focussed family investment office, has started 2022 with three new investments.
The new investments span a variety of sectors and types of investment ranging from growth investment to a SaaS analytics company, a buy-and-build of children’s nurseries and the buyout of a pharmaceuticals business.
Growth investment in Akixi
Akixi provides businesses with a cloud-based analytics platform helping companies transform how they track and understand their communications. Akixi has grown rapidly to become a leading provider in its niche across both the UK and US.
Souter has backed Axiom Equity, a B2B SaaS technology investor, who led the investment alongside True North Advisory who join as strategic partners. True North Advisory’s partners include Mike Tessler and Scott Hoffpauir, the founders and former management team of BroadSoft, Inc. Craig Decker, who previously led BroadSoft in EMEA, and subsequently led the Cisco Worldwide Cloud and Hosted Group joins Akixi as Chief Executive Officer to implement the company’s international growth strategy.
For more information visit Akixi here (https://www.akixi.com).
Acquisition of Kids Planet
Souter has backed Fremman Capital the pan-European mid-market private equity firm to acquire a majority stake in Kids Planet Day Nurseries. Kids Planet is the UK’s largest independently owned nursery operator, ranked #1 for quality childcare provision.
Kids Planet is a North-West England focussed provider, with their 107 sites mostly clustered around the Liverpool and Manchester area (with a recent expansion to Oxford) and responsibility for the care and education of over 10,000 children.
Co-founder and CEO Clare Roberts has led a number of acquisitions and greenfield openings, expanding the roll-out of Kids Planet’s site from 17 to 107. The investment from Fremman will support the acceleration of Kids Planet’s national expansion, further senior hires and ongoing recruitment across its settings.
For more information visit Kids Planet here (https://www.kidsplanetdaynurseries.co.uk/)
Acquisition of Surepharm
Souter has backed Chiltern Capital, a UK private equity investor, in its acquisition of Centaur Healthcare Limited (trading as “Surepharm”). Surepharm is a contract development manufacturing organisation (CDMO) predominantly servicing the pharmaceutical market.
Surepharm provides outsourced formulation, development, manufacturing and packaging of products for its customers in the UK and overseas. The company currently specialises in producing solid dose tablets and capsules, including niche medicines, controlled drugs and veterinary products.
Under new ownership and a new management team led by Richard Yarwood, who joins as Chair, Chiltern’s investment will support Surepharm to enhance its formulation and development offering and fund expansion into new dosage forms. Additionally, an investment into a sales and marketing function as well as complementary M&A will enable Surepharm to provide both existing and new customers with an end-to-end service, from drug development through to a packaged commercial product across a broad range of product types.
For more information visit Surepharm here (https://www.surepharm.com/).
These transactions continue Souter Investments’ approach of investing through the cycle in a variety of different sectors and types of transactions.
Since formation in 2006, Souter has invested in more than 60 unquoted companies, either as the lead investor or as a partner for other financial sponsors. It currently has a portfolio of significant investments in more than 30 businesses.