Private equity fund Summa Equity AB has confirmed that it has agreed to a deal that will see it acquire the remaining 25 percent of Polish salmon and whitefish value-added processing company Milarex.
The Stockholm, Sweden-based fund, which purchased 75 percent of the shares in Milarex from Friendmall Ltd. in 2017, told SeafoodSource that Milarex InvestCo AS, a company controlled by Summa Equity, had entered an agreement with Friendmall to purchase Friendmalls’ 25 percent ownership stake in Milarex Holding AS.
Milarex Holding controls all shares in the operating companies with the Milarex group of companies.
“We are delighted with the very positive development in Milarex, and we have therefore wanted to increase our ownership in the company. We are pleased to have found this solution with Friendmall,” Summa Equity Managing Partner Reynir Indahl said. “The company has from our initial investment in 2017 developed very strongly with high growth and has positioned itself as one of the leading companies within value-added processing in seafood. We will continue to support the international growth of the company.”
Milarex began operations in 2016 and produced 17,000 metric tons (MT) of seafood products last year. It has a recently extended production facility in Slupsk, Poland, from which it supplies most of the retailers in Germany. It also has a customer base that extends across Europe into Scandinavia, Japan, and North America, and has distribution offices in Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and France.
Friendmall is a company controlled by Jerzy Malek, who will remain as an advisor to the company. Malek was formerly the CEO and founder of salmon processing company Morpol, which he sold to Marine Harvest (now Mowi) in 2012.
Photo courtesy of Milarex
