London - Nomad Foods, a packaged foods company backed by entrepreneurs Martin E Franklin and Noam Gottesman, is buying the continental European operations of Findus Group for 500 million pounds ($781 million), adding to its scale as a frozen-food producer.
The purchase from investors including Lion Capital, Highbridge Capital and Sankaty Advisors comes four months after Nomad agreed to purchase Iglo Foods Holdings Ltd., the maker of Birds Eye frozen vegetables, for 2.6 billion euros ($2.9 billion). The Findus business adds leading positions in France, Sweden, Norway and Finland, Nomad said in a statement Thursday.
“Having the businesses under one umbrella brings together two talented, world-class teams, enabling us to share best practices and to elevate and evolve the brand,” Nomad’s CEO Stefan Descheemaeker said in the statement.
Nomad will pay 400 million pounds in cash, using existing cash and further debt funding from UBS, Credit Suisse Group and Barlcays. It will also issue 8.4 million shares to the sellers. The shares climbed 5.6 percent in London to $21.81.
The combination of Iglo and Findus will create a frozen food giant with products spanning fish fingers, peas and microwavable lasagna. Iglo is the world’s second-largest frozen-food manufacturer, with 3.3 percent of the market in 2014, according to data from Euromonitor International.
The founders of Nomad are known as dealmakers. Franklin built Florida-based Jarden into a consumer-goods empire valued at about $10.4 billion, while Gottesman co-founded hedge fund GLG Partners Inc. and sold the firm to Man Group in 2010.
Nomad raised $485 million from an initial public offering in April 2014 to fund acquisitions in the food and beverage industry. At the time of the Iglo acquisition, Nomad said it will raise about $750 million more from a private placement to institutional investors.
BLOOMBERG