Rockpool exits Fortus for 2.5x

12 December 2022

Rockpool Investments (“Rockpool”) has agreed to exit its investment in Fortus Group in an MBO transaction backed by AIB Equity Capital.

Fortus is one of the UK and Ireland’s largest providers of security equipment and monitoring services within the CCTV, fire, intruder detection and access control product verticals. Rockpool backed Fortus’ management team to consolidate the UK security market with a buy-and-build strategy in December 2019 at which point Michael O’Donnell was appointed as chair. He had previously chaired Creative Car Park for Rockpool, which was successfully sold to Inflexion in March 2019.

Rockpool and AIB provided further funding in March 2021 to support the simultaneous acquisitions of Enterprise Security and Re:Sure, resulting in Fortus revenues reaching over €100m.

Following Rockpool’s exit, the Fortus management team, led by CEO Mark Brophy, will continue the company’s consolidation of the security market with further strategic acquisitions lined up in the UK and Europe. O’Donnell stepped down as chair upon Rockpool’s successful exit, which has delivered a 2.5x return and 36% IRR for Rockpool equity investors.