This month, Dunedin, the UK mid-market private equity house, celebrates the twentieth anniversary of its formation as an independent business, following a management buyout in 1996.
Today, Dunedin is an independent company, which is majority-owned by its directors and staff. With more than £400 million committed and under management, it employs a highly experienced team of 28, including 17 investment professionals, and operates from offices in Edinburgh and London. Dunedin’s roots go back as far as 1983 when it was first incorporated as a subsidiary of the Bank of Scotland.
During the last twenty years, Dunedin has invested in more than 50 businesses and has successfully completed 35 exits, returning a total of £670 million to its investors. Notable investments, which exemplify Dunedin’s value adding support, include:
- CitySprint - to which Dunedin provided access to £17.4m of follow on funding in support of 21 acquisitions;
- Kee Safety - which is achieving strong international growth as a result of an active organic and acquisitive strategy, and has completed 10 acquisitions since the Dunedin-led buyout in 2013;
- WFEL - which enhanced and expanded its international sales by nearly 70% over the lifetime of Dunedin’s investment, before attracting the interest of an international trade buyer in 2012
Dunedin has successfully raised four limited partnership funds, backed by more than 40 institutional investors from the UK and Europe, and has managed a publicly quoted investment trust. Dunedin’s latest fund, Dunedin Buyout Fund III, was oversubscribed at £300 million in July 2013.
Shaun Middleton, Managing Partner at Dunedin, commented: “It is great to reach this landmark anniversary and to reflect on how much the team at Dunedin has accomplished in twenty years.
“Our industry has evolved during that time and we are a very different business from the one that we created in 1996. We have significantly grown our funds under management, as well as our investment portfolio and our team. But our core values have not changed. We remain committed to nurturing our people; and I credit them with the success that we have had in raising and deploying our funds, and in creating value for our investors.
“We also remain fully committed to building long-term relationships and working in partnership with management; and, we retain our clear focus on backing the UK’s hidden champions - businesses with a leadership position in their niche and the potential to achieve international growth.”
In the last eighteen months, Dunedin has made three investments in the financial and business services sectors - Kingsbridge Risk Solutions, Alpha FMC and Blackrock PM; and has successfully sold its original stake in CitySprint via a £175m secondary MBO.