Advent International and GS Capital Partners VI Fund, LP and certain of its affiliates have signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire TransUnion from its current stockholders, including Madison Dearborn Partners and the Pritzker family business interests.
The transaction, which is expected to close late first quarter or early second quarter of 2012, values TransUnion at over USD3 billion. TransUnion President and Chief Executive Officer Bobby Mehta and the rest of the company’s leadership team will remain with TransUnion.
“Since we spun TransUnion out of the Marmon Group we have extended the global footprint into more than a dozen countries and are leading change in the way many industries, like healthcare and insurance, leverage data assets,” says Penny Pritzker, chair of TransUnion’s Board of Directors. “The foundation and global infrastructure we have built in terms of technology, solutions and talent will serve TransUnion and its new owners well as they continue to accelerate on global growth opportunities. I wish the TransUnion management team and all the associates the very best in this next, and very exciting, stage in the evolution of the company.”
“TransUnion has demonstrated strong growth under the support and guidance that Penny Pritzker has provided as our chairman, and we have benefited greatly from the resources, network and expertise of Madison Dearborn Partners,” says Mehta. “We look forward to working closely with the Advent and Goldman Sachs teams to continue executing against our strategic blueprint by remaining focused on providing our clients with highly attentive service and the very best information and risk management products.”
“Penny, Bobby, Madison Dearborn and the TransUnion team have built a remarkably strong organisation with long-standing customer relationships and a reputation for product and service excellence,” says Chris Egan, a Managing Director at Advent. “We intend to build on those foundations and grow TransUnion by ensuring that the company continues to deliver superior information and risk management tools both in the US and in key growth markets like Latin America.”
“TransUnion is a high quality organisation with market-leading product offerings and a strong management team. We are very excited to partner with Advent and the management team on this investment,” say Sumit Rajpal, a Managing Director at GS Capital Partners.
“We are pleased with the many accomplishments we have achieved at TransUnion in partnership with the Pritzker Family business interests, Penny, Bobby and the company’s executive team, and we believe TransUnion is in a strong position to continue its expansion,” says Tim Hurd, a Managing Director at Madison Dearborn. “We wish the TransUnion, Advent and GS Capital Partners teams continued success.”
TransUnion was advised by BofA Merrill Lynch and Deutsche Bank. Legal counsel was provided to TransUnion and the current stockholders by Latham & Watkins. The Sponsors were advised by Evercore Partners and Goldman, Sachs & Co., with Deutsche Bank and affiliates of Goldman, Sachs & Co. providing bank and bridge financing commitments. Legal counsel was provided to the Sponsors by Davis Polk & Wardwell, Weil Gotshal & Manges, and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
