Coffey chairman Stephen Williams told the company’s annual general meeting today the acquisition of Carson Group for a total consideration of approximately $32 million would be settled by a combination of $12 million cash and 5.6 million shares.
In New Zealand, the Carson Group business is managed out of offices in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, with branches in Hamilton and Queenstown. In Australia, it has offices in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, with branches in Townsville and Newcastle.
Carson Group will become part of an integrated Coffey project management division which currently comprises the Clifton Coney Group (CCG).
“Carson is a major Australian and New Zealand based project management provider with expertise in property, infrastructure, technology and business operations that provides project management services to a diverse group of institutional, corporate, public and private sector clients,” Williams said.
“It is an excellent strategic fit with the Coffey/Clifton Coney Group project management business and on completion will see the combined business as a major player in the Australian and New Zealand markets.”
The acquisition comes on the back of the announcement earlier this week that Coffey International had agreed to purchase 100% of Haralambous Dowse in Canberra and a 51% stake in Duncan Rhodes in South Africa.
All three acquisitions are subject to satisfaction of conditions precedent and are expected to be completed by the end of the calendar year.
Coffey managing director Roger Olds told the AGM that today’s agreement has grown Coffey’s project management business into a substantial division in its own right and would help Coffey deliver on its strategy to be a clear market leader in the specialist project management field.
“With a team of almost 400 staff working in five countries on over 200 projects with a combined value of around $10 billion, this recent acquisition trail will make Coffey the largest project management provider in its markets in Australasia,” Olds said.
“Coffey now has significant geographic reach, an extensive client base and a great depth of specialist knowledge and resources. This positions the company to provide world-class project management services and allows it to benefit from the current and future infrastructure booms in the regions in which it operates.”
CCG chief executive Peter Coney said the acquisition of Carson is strategic on a number of levels – while Clifton Coney Group and Carson both provide project management services in overlapping geographic regions, they work in different market sectors with different clients and have different strengths.
“While neither Clifton Coney Group nor Carson previously had a presence in Canberra, the recent acquisition of Haralambous Dowse has facilitated this and combined with the Carson Group acquisition has elevated Coffey’s project management division to the dominant position in the Australian and New Zealand markets,” Coney said.
Coffey International also announced today a two for seven non-renounceable rights issue, to be fully underwritten by Lodge Corporate Services, to raise approximately $80 million.
The offer will be made under a prospectus lodged with the Australian Securities & Investments Commission tomorrow. The funds will be used to strengthen the balance sheet and to provide Coffey with enhanced funding capacity for future acquisitions.
“This is an exciting day for Coffey as it is the first rights issue we have undertaken since listing on the Australian Stock Exchange in 1990,” Williams said.
“We have grown the company substantially over the past few years and we now wish to access additional capital to continue this growth strategy. We have a strong pipeline of potential new deals and we have been successful at integrating acquisitions into the Coffey multi-specialist business model.”
