Quadrant private equity looking to acquire Neil Perry's Rockpool Group
The word in the market is that Quadrant private equity is now running the ruler over Neil Perry’s Rockpool Group.
The Rockpool portfolio is well known around the traps with Rockpool Bar & Grill restaurants in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth; Spice Temple in Sydney and Melbourne; Burger Project and Eleven Bridge in Sydney; and Rosetta in Melbourne.
Rockpool has bought in KPMG Corporate Finance for advice while Rockpool is relying on its own resources.
Both sides are looking to finalise a deal before the end of October.
The deal is significant for Quadrant because it brings the Neil Perry brand into the company’s stable. Perry is a household name in the Australian hospitality industry. Apart from co-owning and being executive chef at numerous restaurants around Australia, he also co-ordinates Qantas Flight Centre Catering under his company Rockpool Consulting and cooks high-quality Korean BBQ. He is Australia’s expert in Asian cuisine.
Quadrant has made no secret of its plans to expand into this market. The acquisition of the Rockpool brand fits in with Quadrant’s strategy of becoming a major player in this space.
It made its intentions quite clear back in November when it swooped on restaurant entrepreneur John Szangolies’s Urban Purveyor Group, picking it up for a tidy $175 million.
The Urban Purveyor Group is the company behind the four-outlet Sake restaurant brand, Ananas Brasserie, the Cut, Swine & Co and the 11-outlet Bavarian Bier Café as part of a portfolio made up of 20 restaurants and associated businesses.
Significantly, KPMG Corporate Finance was involved in that deal too, fielding offers for the Urban Purveyor Group.
And on April, the Urban Purveyor Group picked up popular Italian diner Fratelli Fresh for an undisclosed sum.
Fratelli Fresh has six restaurants (five Café Sopra and one Café Nice) in its portfolio and four fresh produce retail outlets.
As part of its strategy, Quadrant has also rolled the operations of the Melbourne-based Superior Food Services into Sydney-headquartered NFD Food Services to create a national group.
by Leon Gettler, September 27th 2016