SFW Acquires AgData
The purchase of the Carousel Capital portfolio company marks the firm’s initial investment.
February 8, 2010
Middle market buyout firm SFW Capital Partners purchased a stake in the agricultural analytics company Agdata, L.P. from the company's founder and Carousel Capital, a Southeast buyout firm. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
According to a person familiar with the transaction, Agdata management and Carousel each owned a 50 percent stake in the business. The person said SFW now owns a control stake in Agdata. The portfolio company's chief executive officer Richard Bettison and founder Verl Purdy each retain “significant minority stakes” in Agdata, while Carousel Capital continues to own a lesser minority stake.
Carousel Capital initially invested in Agdata in 2006. Carousel managing partner Charles S. Grigg led the transaction for the Charlotte, North Carolina-based firm and managing partner William T. Hobbs II worked on the transaction. In speaking with Mergers & Acquisitions, Hobbs declined to disclose the return on its initial investment, but said the exit was “a very successful transaction.” He said the initial investment was within the firm's typical investment range, between $10 to $30 million in equity.
The 25-year-old target company, also based in Charlotte, collects point-of-sale and EDI data and provides data analysis services. SFW co-founders and partners Roger C. Freeman and Thomas P. Salice serve respectively as Agdata chairman and board director. Simultaneously, MedData, the company’s healthcare unit, was sold to Chicago, Illinois-based TransUnion LLC, the consumer credit reporting agency.
The purchase of Agdata marks SFW’s initial investment since the firm was founded in 2007 by Thomas Salice, Roger Freeman, Casey A. Lynch, David N. Webb and Norman E. Wells, Jr. Aside from Webb, who was previously vice chairman of investment banking at Merrill Lynch, the co-founders were former pros at New York-based AEA Investors LLC.
Previously, Freeman worked on related analytical information investments, including AEA Investors’ purchase of a minority stake in IAG Research, prior to The Nielsen Company’s acquisition of the television advertisement ratings company. He also worked on investments into Telephia, Inc. and XM Satellite Radio.
In March 2008, the private equity firm raised $300 million in its initial fund, investing primarily in healthcare and industrial businesses.
New York-based Golub Capital lender provided leveraged financing for the transaction. Harris Williams & Co. served as advisor to Agdata in the transactions.
In addition to its headquarters in Rye, New York, SFW maintains an additional office in Hudson, Ohio. The mid-market firm declined to comment of the transaction. Calls to Agdata were not returned by press time Monday.
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