Funds advised by Cinven, Permira and Mid Europa are to acquire Polish online marketplace Allegro Group from Naspers for USD3.253 billion.
Established in 1999, Allegro has more than 20 million registered users who carry out 14 million transactions monthly.
In addition, the group operates Ceneo, a price comparison platform in Poland.
It is headquartered in Poznan, Poland and employs 1,275 people.
David Barker, partner at Cinven, says: “Allegro is a great business. It is a clear market leader and extremely well positioned to benefit from structural e-commerce drivers with a strong technology platform and strong reputation with its users. We are very excited to be working with management to drive the business growth and we are looking forward to working alongside Permira and Mid Europa.”
Richard Sanders, partner at Permira, says: “The Permira Funds have been backing internet leaders for many years. In Allegro we have found a real gem which is the pre-eminent consumer and merchant internet brand in Poland. The business has a fantastic underlying technology platform and we look forward to backing the management team to develop it further. We believe Allegro is ideally positioned to capture the next wave of growth in online and mobile commerce.”
Pawel Padusinski, partner at Mid Europa, adds: “We recognise the strong organic growth opportunities available in the Polish e-commerce and retail sectors. Our investment in Allegro is consistent with our strategy of supporting leading market players with impressive track records in the CEE region. We are enthusiastic about working closely with the management team and our partners from Cinven and Permira in supporting Allegro’s further growth.”
Przemyslaw Budkowski, chief executive of Allegro, says: “The combination of Cinven, Permira and Mid Europa provides us with unrivalled expertise in growing ecommerce and technology businesses in emerging Europe. We are delighted to have attracted their financial backing and operational insights going forward, as well as their investment commitment to the business to considerably enhance our customers’ experience.”
