Dublin-based plastics firm IPL and Dutch peer to merge
It employs about 2,500 people across 16 manufacturing sites.
Schoeller Allibert, which has about 1,600 employees, makes returnable transport packaging and provides related services. Its customers are primarily in sectors such as beverages, food, automotive, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, retail and material handling. They're based mainly in continental Europe.
The company generated revenue of $550m last year.
IPL is owned by investment funds managed by US-based private equity giant Madison Dearborn Partners, and Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ).
Schoeller Allibert is owned by Brookfield Asset Management's private equity business and the Schoeller family.
The new company will be 55pc-owned by the existing IPL shareholders and 45pc-owned by the existing Schoeller Allibert shareholders.
The merged group will be based in Dublin and be headed by IPL chief executive Alan Walsh.
'The future of packaging lies in sustainability, innovation and adaptability,' he said. 'This merger will allow IPL and Schoeller Allibert to combine our strengths on both sides of the Atlantic to meet that future together.'
IPL was formerly known as One51. It was sold for €354m to Madison Dearborn in 2020, having listed on the Toronto stock exchange in 2018.
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At the time, its shareholders included about 2,000 individual farmers and investors, as well as agricultural co-ops including Kerry, Glanbia, Lakeland and Dairygold. They had held stock in the company since it was spun out of IAWS as One51.
One51 emerged out of the IAWS group of companies as an investment firm but entered the plastics business in 2006 when it acquired Protech Plastics.
Its €200m purchase of a 67pc stake in Canadian firm IPL in July 2015 was transformational, shifting it from a mixed investment vehicle to a straightforward plastics company.
In 2017, CDPQ and a number of other large IPL shareholders swapped their shares in the Canadian company for shares in One51, which changed its name to IPL Plastics.
Businessman Dermot Desmond sold his almost 23pc stake to CDPQ the same year in a deal valued at the time at around €65m.
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