THE DEAL:
The secondary buy-out of Avantis, the Gloucester-based innovative provider of virtual reality-based learning technology to the international education market. The transaction allowed Key Capital Partners to realise its investment while reinvesting in a minority stake alongside LDC as part of the latest deal. LDC has backed Avantis’ existing management team, led by Founder Nik Tuson and Managing Director Huw Williams, to further enhance its suite of products and services and continue Avantis’ international expansion. Founded in 2007, the company has delivered its diverse portfolio of learning products to tens of thousands of schools in more than 90 countries worldwide. It has also developed the world’s first virtual reality (VR) system designed for classrooms. With the launch of Avantis World, the world’s first educational VR theme park, and Eduverse, a safe and secure K-12 Metaverse platform, the company is set to drive significant growth in new market segments and territories.
OUR ROLE:
Having worked with Avantis since the launch of ClassVR in 2017, and having advised on the investment from KCP in 2020, we continued to work closely with the Avantis management team and KCP to evaluate options for further realisation of value while procuring the right partner for the next phase of Avantis’ growth. We initiated and managed a vendor-led due diligence process to deliver a competitive process amongst a short-list of pre-qualified private equity firms which were attracted to Avantis’ market-leading solutions and highly regarded management team. We structured the investment to meet our clients’ cash out and reinvestment objectives and negotiated terms to select LDC as the preferred partner before managing the due diligence and legal processes to complete the transaction within four months of initial management meetings. In addition we sourced a debt package from Virgin Money comprising an A and B term loan structure plus a working capital facility in the form of a revolving credit facility.
WHAT OUR CLIENT SAID:
“The intimate knowledge that the Cattaneo team had of our business model and financial systems was instrumental in us putting the investment proposition together efficiently, including our growth forecasts, and then in preparing and managing multiple vendor-led due diligence workstreams. Having established initial investor interest they capitalised on this to build momentum and enthusiasm through a competitive process. As they have done so previously, Cattaneo worked seamlessly to tight deadlines as part of our own team and with our other advisers.”
Nik Tuson, Founder, Avantis