Riordan Lewis & Haden | Equity Partners’ (RLH) portfolio company, ABB Concise Optical Group, has been recapitalised by New Mountain Capital.
The transaction provided a favourable financial outcome for RLH’s investors while affording the ABB Concise management team the opportunity to continue their growth strategy in partnership with a new investor.
ABB Concise, based in Coral Springs, Florida, is the nation’s largest distributor of soft contact lenses. The company supplies more than two-thirds of the independent eye care professionals in America with brand name contact lenses, high grade ophthalmic products, and fully customisable gas permeable lenses.
The ABB Concise transaction is the third liquidity event within the RLH portfolio in 2012, following upon successful exits earlier in the year with respect to portfolio companies maxIT Healthcare and Creative Circle. The three transactions collectively represented total equity value in excess of USD1bn.
J Christopher Lewis, managing director of RLH, says: "These three liquidity events demonstrate the power of our firm’s differentiated approach to private equity. Each of these portfolio companies achieved a high rate of organic growth over a multi-year period despite weak economic times, while utilising conservative levels of debt. Our companies increased revenue organically at compound annual rates ranging from 15 per cent to 35 per cent. And each of them grew EBITDA significantly faster than revenue. Perhaps most importantly, these enterprises also translated their accelerated growth into even more rapid rates of equity value creation."
