Alantra advises GCP and the shareholders of Chaucer Consulting on major international investment by BIP

Jul 2020

Investment

Alantra, the independent global mid-market investment banking firm, has advised Growth Capital Partners (“GCP”) and the shareholders of Chaucer Consulting (“Chaucer”), one of the UK’s leading challenger consultancies specialising in people-led digital transformation in the UK and US, on a major investment made by  Business Integration Partners (“BIP”), an Italian headquartered international consultancy.

GCP backed Chris Laslett and the senior Chaucer management team in 2014. Since then, the business has doubled revenue and profit. Chaucer has expanded its digital-led services capability, widened its customer base, acquired the CIO advisory consultancy Virtrium and doubled consultant headcount to over 300 people. It has also been recognised as one of the UK’s leading consultancies by the Financial Times.

BIP was founded in 2003 and is headquartered in Milan, Italy. Over the past 17 years, BIP has grown to become a leading international challenger consultancy with more than 2,700 professionals across 12 countries and offices in Italy, EMEA, North and South America. The investment in Chaucer will allow BIP to expand their service offering in the UK and the US whilst being a natural fit with BIP’s strategic goal to become one of the top international consulting companies in the world.

The investment in Chaucer demonstrates Alantra’s ongoing activity within the professional services and consulting sector and follows the investment in Redington by Phoenix Equity Partners and the sale of Sol-Tec to ECI-owned IT Lab. The Alantra deal team included partner Richard Holden, director Simon Roberts, Josh Jones and Harry Sparks.

Richard Holden, partner at Alantra who advised on the deal, said, “We’re delighted to have advised GCP and the team at Chaucer on this transaction. Chaucer represents the ideal UK partner for BIP as well as giving it access to the US market. Together they will continue the strategy of building a global digital transformation challenger brand and it is testament to the resilience of both businesses that they traded well through Covid-19 and the deal completed remotely in lockdown. Under the leadership of co-founder Chris Laslett, Chaucer has become a high growth consulting business of scale delivering end to end digital transformation for a range of leading global companies and enterprises. The partnership with BIP represents an exciting phase for both businesses.

Digital transformation is a high strategic priority and many old-world businesses are concerned they are too slow moving and not able to maintain competitive advantage, relevance and stay successful without it. As such, Chaucer’s expertise is regarded as a non-discretionary, core operational investment by its client base.”

Simon Roberts, director at Alantra who advised on the deal, added, “The deal is significant as we continue to see strong interest in digital transformation consulting services from larger strategic competitors and private equity-backed businesses like BIP. These services are experiencing strong growth in demand, driven by the requirement of traditional industries to remain agile and competitive, the adoption of disruptive technologies and the response to Covid-19. ​Combined with attractive business models – strong repeat revenues from high growth and macro-resilient sectors, delivery of non-discretionary projects and trusted advice – we expect demand for the best consultancies to remain high.”

Chris Laslett, CEO of Chaucer, said: “I am delighted that Chaucer and BIP are joining together. Chaucer people are a talented and diverse international community, and I saw that reflected in the BIP family. This next stage of growth creates huge opportunities for both companies, by significantly increasing abilities to enable our clients to become true digital enterprises. I look forward to collaborating with our new colleagues in this truly exciting partnership. I want to thank each of the Alantra team for their support and efforts that produced a great result for everyone.”