Sun Capital Partners’ portfolio company Sonneborn, Inc. (“Sonneborn”) has been sold to One Equity Partners. Terms of the transaction have not been disclosed.
Sonneborn, based in Parsippany, NJ, was acquired from a large publicly-traded company in June 2005 in a corporate carve-out transaction. Upon acquisition, a series of initiatives were implemented to improve manufacturing productivity and cash management, streamline corporate infrastructure, optimise the product offering, and reduce costs by developing non-traditional raw material sources. A disciplined approach was taken to supply agreements and the termination of unfavourable supply agreements generated substantial savings.
In 2010, Sonneborn completed the acquisition of the Sodium Sulfonate and Oxidized Petrolatum businesses of Chemtura Corporation, Inc., expanding Sonneborn’s product offering and generating manufacturing synergies; simultaneously, Sonneborn introduced new products to customers. As a result, sales have increased by more than 50% and EBITDA has increased by more than four times for the twelve months ended December 30, 2011 versus the twelve months prior to acquisition.
“The transformation of Sonneborn into a stand-alone, high-growth global business is the result of a series of strategic, operational efforts and a disciplined focus on identifying and relentlessly pursuing opportunities for operational improvement,” says Marc Leder, Co-CEO at Sun Capital Partners. “We have worked closely with the management team to achieve a significant improvement in Sonneborn’s performance since 2005, and are confident that the Company will continue to flourish under One Equity Partners’ guidance.”
Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP served as Sun Capital Partners’ legal counsel on the transaction, and Lazard Middle Market LLC provided financial advisory services.
