Executive team pays £65m for Jarvis Porter division

The managing director of Industrial Print Group, Mr Mark Foley, is one of an eight-strong management team of executives from Ireland, Britain and the US, which has paid £65.5 million sterling (€103.6 million) for the electronics division of the British group, Jarvis Porter. The cross-border management buyout is backed by two British venture capital groups, Natwest Equity and Mercury Equity.

Industrial Print, based in Bray, is one of four companies in the electronics division and accounts for about 30 per cent of the division's total turnover. The other companies are Donprint Product Identification, Precision ID Products and Jeka. The division has 10 plants in Ireland, Britain, Holland, Hungary, Germany, China, Singapore and Finland.

The Jarvis Porter electronics division had overall sales of £29.1 million sterling and pre-tax profits of £6.6 million sterling in the year to last February.

Industrial Print itself was bought by Jarvis Porter in June 1997 for £10.3 million, but the former shareholders are no longer with the company.

Industrial Print sales director Mr Noel Boyle said it was expected that a scheme would be put in place to allow executives other than the eight involved in the MBO to take equity in the new company, which has yet to be named. He said the MBO group came up with the proposal, which fitted in with Jarvis Porter's long-terms strategy of exiting the electronics industry.

Mr Boyle said the new company would expand relationships with electronics manufacturers such as Compaq, Dell and Motorola. The geographic focus of the four companies in the division would be maintained.

He said that the venture capital backers had set no timescale for getting a return on their investment, but added that investments of this type usually had a three-five-year timeframe. No decision on an exit mechanism has been taken but all the various options would be explored.

Industrial Print, which specialises in screen printing and metal forming for the electronics industry, was founded in 1977 by Mr Gerard Casey, who was one of the main beneficiaries of the 1997 buyout by Jarvis Porter.