News
LDC exits transport software provider Mandata
7 Oct 2021
Leading mid-market private equity firm LDC has exited its investment in transport management software provider Mandata to Tenzing.
LDC backed Newcastle-headquartered Mandata in May 2018 to support the business’ growth strategy and build on its position as a market leading transport technology provider.
Mandata’s pioneering SaaS-based solution allows the UK’s carrier and haulage businesses to manage workflow and data more effectively, with products including traffic planning and management, tracking, telematics, and invoicing. The company employs 120 people across its offices in Newcastle, Leeds, London and Leicestershire. It supports its loyal base of 2,000 customers with compliance, improving productivity, delivering efficiency savings, reducing carbon emissions and provides real-time visibility of their operations.
LDC backed Mandata’s acquisitive growth strategy, working alongside the management team to complete two major acquisitions. In 2020 LDC provided follow-on funding to help the business to acquire Returnloads.net, and in 2021 Mandata completed the acquisition of Stirling Solutions. The acquisitions further expanded its customer base and breadth of digital services. During the three-year partnership, LDC also supported the business to invest in new product development, enhance its sales capabilities and make the transition to being a SaaS provider. LDC supported Mandata to invest in its senior team, recruiting a new Chief Revenue Officer, Steve Spark, and Chief Financial Officer, Michael Tagg.
LDC’s support helped the business to double its revenue and headcount, grow its customer base from 300 to over 2000 and position the business as the leading provider of transport management software solutions to the UK SME market.
Chris Rigg, CEO of Mandata, said: “LDC’s support has been invaluable to the growth of Mandata. Gareth and his team completely backed our growth strategy and worked alongside our management team to provide operational support and help us to complete two significant acquisitions.”
LDC’s local presence in the North East was important to our close working relationship with the team and it has been incredibly helpful to draw on their tech and software expertise. We now have a strong foundation in place to succeed in the next stage of our growth journey.”
Gareth Marshall, Head of LDC in the North East, added: “We’re proud to have helped an exciting North East business to grow by supporting strategic acquisitions and investing in its operations. With its ambitious and highly-skilled team, Mandata is a brilliant example of the innovative businesses we have here in the North East, and we wish everyone at the company the best for the future.”
Guy Gillon, Co-Founder and Joint Managing Partner of Tenzing, said: “Mandata’s mission critical software has never been more important to the supply chain. We’re super excited to work with Chris and the team to build on top of the strong foundations already in place, including a 94% customer retention rate and double-digit revenue growth. There’s a lot of potential in Mandata’s niche and we’ll be leveraging the full extent of our Growth Team to help Chris and team achieve our shared vision.”
The financial terms of the transaction are undisclosed.
LDC and Mandata were advised by KPMG (corporate finance), Muckle (legal), KPMG (financial due diligence) and Roland Berger (commercial due diligence).
Management were advised by Paul Kaiser (corporate finance) and UNW (tax).