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Mid Europa Partners (Mid Europa), the leading private equity investor in Central and South Eastern Europe, announced today that it has entered into an agreement to sell Zabka Polska (‘Zabka’ or the ‘Company’), to funds advised by CVC Capital Partners (the ‘Transaction’). The Transaction is subject to customary competition authority clearance, and is expected to close in Q2 2017. Zabka sale is the largest ever transaction in the Polish food retail sector and the largest ever private equity exit in Poland. Together with the Alpha exit announced earlier this year, Mid Europa is poised to return over €1.1 billion to its investors during Q2 2017.
Robert Knorr, Co-Managing Partner of Mid Europa and head of its retail and consumer practice, commented: "Our successful exit from Zabka validates Mid Europa's focus on creating value through identifying, growing and exiting highly attractive retail businesses. Our recent investments in Allegro and Profi reaffirm our continued commitment to the CEE retail landscape. As in Zabka, where we built a clear regional champion with a store network of 4,500 outlets, we will continue supplementing the buy-and-build strategy with strong execution."
Zbigniew Rekusz, a member of the Mid Europa senior team who led the firm's investment into Zabka in 2011 and helped drive its transformational change until its exit in 2017 said: "We feel privileged having had the opportunity to work with Zabka management and continue to believe they are excellently placed to lead the Company through the next exciting growth cycle ahead."
The transaction execution was led by Berke Biricik with the support of Lukasz Wlodarczyk and Bartosz Malecki.
JP Morgan acted as exclusive financial adviser to Mid Europa, White & Case and CMS Cameron McKenna as its legal counsels, Ernst & Young as transaction services adviser, OC&C and Beragua as commercial advisers and ERM as its environmental, health and safety adviser.
