Another high-profile acquisition on Italian leather. Investment fund NB Renaissance Partners has purchased the majority of Trissino-based Rino Mastrotto Group. There had been chatter for a while, which has been confirmed now, just a few weeks after confirmation that Tuscan tannery Samanta was bought by French group Chanel.
The operation
After months spent negotiating terms (and offers from over 15 funds), confirmation arrived at the beginning of August. Rino Mastrotto Group’s management signed, via the agreement, 70% of ownership over to NB Renaissance Partners. Rino Mastrotto (vicepresident of UNIC – Italian Tanners, in picture on the left), remains the group’s president, along with his son, Matteo (CEO) and his daughter Barbara, who is in charge of the company’s automotive division. “This isn’t a sale, but rather an operation to consolidate our position”, stated Mr. Mastrotto to Il Giornale di Vicenza (local newspaper). Words that confirm the wish to continue investing in the group based in Vicenza. RMG placed on the market a 12-million-euro mini-bond in May 2017 in order to support 2020’s development plan. The group closed the fiscal year of 2018 with 320 million euro of revenue and 850 employees.
NB’s motivations
“Rino Mastrotto Group perfectly fits our investment strategy because it is an example of made-in-Italy excellence around the world – states an official note sent out by NB Renaissance Partners -. Rino Mastrotto Group presents itself as a well-affirmed company to be imitated by others in the sector, thanks to its capacity to join the high-quality standards of its products to its rigorous environmental policy, which is based on a sustainable and respectful industrial production methodology. Furthermore, we are convinced that it is the ideal platform to grow organically and by consolidating an extremely fragmented market”. NB Renaissance Partners opened in 2015 thanks to the partnership between Neuberger Berman and Intesa SanPaolo. The goal: to manage private equity investments made in Italian businesses.
Two previous cases
Two specific cases need to be cited in the list of financial operations conducted, throughout the last few seasons, on Italian companies operating in the leather industry. Both cases involved private equity funds. The first one is Pasubio, Vicenza-based tannery that sold the majority of ownership in June 2017 to CVC (PE fund). Pasubio published its results for the previous year always in June of 2019, which consisted in the first full year under the new management. In summary, the result was “more than positive”. The second case took place in February 2018, when Chiorino, tannery located in Piedmont, was in part acquired by Italian PE fund Arcadia.
