Nautic Partners, LLC (“Nautic”) is pleased to announce that it has completed the acquisition of Spartech, LLC (“Spartech”), in partnership with Spartech management, from Arsenal Capital Partners (“Arsenal”).
Headquartered in Maryland Heights, MO, Spartech is a leading custom manufacturer of specialized acrylics and other engineered extruded plastics used in a variety of applications and end markets including aerospace & defense, healthcare, industrial, automotive, consumer goods, and packaging. Through its network of 14 plants, Spartech provides acrylic products, plastic sheet and rollstock, specialty film laminates and thermoformed packaging solutions to over 1,000 customers in North America, many of whom have partnered with Spartech for decades. Spartech has a long history of providing customers with innovative material science formulations and engineered solutions. The company’s breadth of highly technical manufacturing capabilities is unique in the industry, utilizing multiple plastic resin types and manufacturing processes including acrylic cell casting, multilayer extrusion, stretching, and thermoforming.
John Inks, COO of Spartech, said, “We are excited to work with the Nautic team as we enter the next phase of Spartech’s growth. Nautic shares our vision of growing this brand, investing in new products, and further enhancing our customer experience. We are proud of our strong customer relationships today and are confident that they will only improve as a result of this new partnership.”
Chris Pierce, a Managing Director of Nautic, said, “What drew us to Spartech was the strength and depth of this management team, long-tenured and sticky customer relationships, and the company’s expertise in truly difficult to manufacture products such as cell cast acrylic, flame-retardant plastic sheet, and multilayered packaging, all of which are used in demanding, highly technical applications. We are very confident that John Inks, Joe Herres, Greg Zeis, Chris Southard and the rest of the Spartech team have the capability to continue driving the initiatives they have spearheaded over the last several years. We’re thrilled to back this team, including Nautic Operating Advisor John Manzi as Executive Chairman, and their effort to take the company to the next level organically and through selective add-on acquisitions. Additionally, as we continue to build out our chemicals thesis we are excited to again be investing in a chemicals-related sector following our previous investment in IPS Corporation, which enabled us to have early conviction on the Spartech opportunity.”
George Abd, an Operating Partner of Arsenal who led the company as Chairman and CEO during Arsenal’s ownership, noted, “Following the carve-out of Spartech from its prior corporate parent, we were extremely pleased to partner with a tremendous group of leaders at the company to implement, improve and out-perform our investment plan.” Joe Rooney, an Investment Partner of Arsenal, continued, “We invested in growth and company development, and enjoyed working with the company to develop long-term strategies that can continue to drive value creation past our ownership.”
Locke Lord LLP represented Nautic in the transaction and BNP Paribas has provided the financing for the transaction. Baird and Kirkland & Ellis LLP advised Spartech and Arsenal.
About Spartech
Headquartered in Maryland Heights, MO, Spartech is a leading converter of engineered plastics including cell cast and extruded sheet, specialty film laminates, and thermoformed packaging solutions. Spartech’s history dates back to the 1960’s and today the company operates 14 plants across the U.S. utilizing a wide breadth of highly technical manufacturing processes and polymer material science capabilities. For more information, please visit www.spartech.com.
About Arsenal
Arsenal is a leading private equity firm that specializes in investments in middle-market specialty industrials and healthcare companies. Since its inception in 2000, Arsenal has raised institutional equity investment funds of $5.3 billion, completed 45 platform investments and achieved 31 realizations. Arsenal invests in industry sectors in which the firm has significant prior knowledge and experience. The firm works with management teams to build strategically important companies with leading market positions, high growth, and high value-add. For more information, please visit www.arsenalcapital.com.