The Business
Kinneir Dufort (“KD”) is a design and product development consultancy which delivers world class innovation services for leading Medical, Consumer and Industrial clients around the globe. Based in Bristol, the team provides outsourced design and innovation services to global multinationals including Roche, AstraZeneca, Unilever, Coca Cola, Thales and Sony, as well as scaling start-ups.
The Deal
Mobeus invested £5.8 million to support the MBO of Kinneir Dufort in 2016. Mobeus secured the deal by demonstrating a thorough understanding of the design process whilst taking a commercial view on the wish of the majority of the previous shareholders to retire from the business immediately on completion.
The Realisation
In 2022, the business was sold to Inflexion-backed SteriPack Group returning a 2.8x MoC and 28% IRR return for Mobeus IV.
The Impact
With Mobeus’s backing, Kinneir Dufort advanced its internal systems and processes to enable the business to scale efficiently, expanded its management team and widened its client base. As a result, the business grew substantially, more than doubling profitability over the investment period. At the same time, the quality of earnings of the business markedly improved through focusing on high-value life science sectors.
