Souter Investments
is one of the UK’s leading family investment offices specialising in private equity

First Scottish

First Scottish

Vintage: August 2009

Exit Date: August 2018

Sector: Legal and Business Services

Location: Dalgety Bay, Fife

Type: Rescue Finance

Souter Role: Lead Investor, Majority Stake

Souter Director: Yes

Status: Realised

First Scottish Group is Scotland’s leading independent firm of professional searchers, delivering a comprehensive suite of fast and accurate search services, primarily for the residential and commercial property markets.

Best known for its title and property searching, First Scottish also offers other searching services in areas such as plans support, title investigation and rectification, environmental reports and mining reports.

Souter Investments invested in First Scottish Group following the onset of the Global Financial Crisis providing finance to recapitalise the Company’s balance sheet and support management’s growth strategy.  With the support of Souter Investments, First Scottish has grown substantially becoming a strong, market leading business focussed on providing true value adding professional expertise and delivering exceptional customer service.

In May 2016, First Scottish completed the sale of its non-core businesses, Legal Post, a secure document exchange network, and First Post, a postal firm, to DX, the independent parcels, mail and logistics operator.

In August 2018, Souter Investments completed an exit of the company to an international private investment group. The undisclosed consideration realised more than 4x return for Souter Investments.

w: www.firstscottish.com

Our business has gone through a significant period of change over the last six years, initially dealing with the deep recessionary impact of the global financial crisis on the Scottish property market, and as the economy started to improve, pursuing growth and introducing new products. We recently also executed a successful sale of two non-core businesses. Throughout that time Souter Investments has maintained a flexible and supportive approach, backing the First Scottish team to deliver on our agreed strategy as we strove to become the market leading professional search firmin Scotland.

Ian Fraser, MD