Morning Hubs!
We’ve been inundated with PE activity over here, whether it’s on the smaller deal side, or secondaries … lots of things are being transacted, even if it’s not at the same tenor of the bull market era.
Bid
Arcline Investment Management, which closed its third fund earlier this year on $4.5 billion, made a bid to acquire CIRCOR International, an industrial valve manufacturer, for $57 per share. Arcline’s offer surpasses a proposal from KKR at $51 per share and comes after the valve maker rejected a bid yesterday from an unnamed buyer that sources said was Arcline.
Going public
The IPO exit window has been essentially closed since at least last year for private equity and venture capital. Lately, there’s been rumblings of a public market reopening, centered around the successful public launch of restaurant chain Cava Group, which opened at $22 per share, and was trading at $45.55 at close of trading Tuesday.
There’s a PE-backed IPO we’ll be watching to see where it goes: Oddity Tech, an Israeli beauty and tech company backed by L Catterton, filed to go public on June 23 looking to raise an estimated $300 million, according to a report from Renaissance Capital. The IPO could price over the next few months.
Oddity owns brands Il Makiage, a direct-to-consumer beauty platform, and online wellness company SpoiledChild, which launched in 2022. As of March 2023, the company had more than 4 million active customers, according to the S-1 filing. As of year-end, the company reported revenue of $324.5 million, including $25.9 million from the launch of SpoiledChild in February 2022, the filing said. That’s up from $222.6 million for the year ended Dec. 31, 2021.
“We are a technology company seeking to reinvent every aspect of a massive industry,” according to Oddity’s filing. “We deploy algorithms and machine learning models leveraging user data seeking to deliver a precise product match and seamless shopping experience.”
In April, the company launched Oddity Labs in conjunction with its acquisition of Revela, a biotech company focused on the development of molecules for beauty and wellness. Oddity Labs is working on using artificial intelligence to develop products.
L Catterton first invested in Oddity in 2017 through its third growth fund. It reduced its stake last year when a group of investors invested $130 million in the company, led by Franklin Templeton, Fidelity Investments, First Light Capital and billionaire Thomas Tull, according to a statement at the time.
More time
Schroders Capital led a process that moved remaining interests in geospatial data company Cyclomedia and Digital Barriers out of Volpi Capital’s first fund and into a continuation pool.
The deal included a group of new investors, as well as Cyclomedia’s management team and Volpi Capital’s new Fund III, representing a trend in the industry of firms using capital from newer pools and help fund secondary deals. Rede Partners worked as adviser on the deal.
The continuation fund will provide more capital and time for Volpi to drive further growth in Cyclomedia, which plans a roll out of new product initiatives and selective add-ons.
Leads
A process we’ve been following is from Providence Equity, which has been offering LPs in its seventh and eighth funds to cash out of their interests in the pools. We have word that BlackRock and Pomona Capital are set as lead buyers on the Fund VII tender process, which would also include a staple of fresh capital into Providence’s ninth fund that has been in market targeting $6 billion.
That’s it for me! Have a great rest of your day. Reach me with tips n’ gossip, feedback or book recommendations (I’m reading Henry James’ dense read The Portrait of a Lady) at cwitkowsky@buyoutsinsider.com or find me on LinkedIn.
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