M Group Services to expand under new ownership

M Group Services has been acquired by a leading private equity firm with plans to continue the group’s expansion. 

Inside the deal: CVC Fund IX is buying the company from French private equity firm PAI Partners, with the deal expected to complete in Q3 of this year. 

Under PAI, M Group has scaled significantly, with revenues increasing from £1 billion in 2018 to more than £2 billion today. 

Its order book has doubled in size, and the group has acquired and integrated 14 complementary businesses to date. 

Past, present, future  

M Group was formed from Morrison Utility Services in 2016, it employs more than 11,000 people and operates from more than 216 sites nationwide. 

The business is known for providing recurring repair and maintenance services to major infrastructure providers in water, energy, telecoms and transport.  

CVC said it will work with M Group management to accelerate its organic growth,
while exploring more strategic mergers and acquisitions (M&A). 

Advising 

Deutsche Bank acted as the lead financial adviser to PAI for the transaction, with Citi also acting as financial adviser. Evercore acted as the financial adviser to CVC. 

Andrew Findlay, chief executive of M Group, said: “We would like to thank PAI Partners for their strong support and commitment to our growth since 2018.  

“We are delighted that CVC has decided to support our clear and ambitious plan to continue to grow and deliver at pace, built on our solid market-leading foundations.” 

Dominic Murphy and Tim Gallico at CVC added: “M Group Services is a leader in an attractive market growing on the back of structural trends linked to ageing infrastructure, decarbonisation initiatives and technology transitions.” 

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