Birds Eye owner reveals appetite for more acquisitions following fresh fundraising
NOMAD Foods, the new owner of Birds Eye and Findus’s European assets, has said it is hungry for more deals.
Nomad, which was set up as a cash vehicle by consumer goods tycoons Martin Franklin and Noam Gottesman, said revenues fell 2.4pc in the year to the end of June.
The group, which bought fish finger maker Iglo Group for €2.6bn (£1.9bn) in April, added Findus Foods’ European business for £500m earlier this month.
The combined group posted a €536m post-tax loss for the year, after various costs and charges relating to the Iglo acquisition.
Stefan Descheemaeker, Nomad’s chief executive, said the results were in line with expectations, given the difficult retail environment across the group’s core geographies. He said No- mad had increased promotions on some of its products to appeal to valueseeking customers, while introducing new items, such as wholegrain chicken nuggets, across its markets.
“We believe Nomad is well positioned to take advantage of numerous growth opportunities across western Europe and globally, not only within the frozen food category, but also the broader packaged food space” said Mr Descheemaeker.
“Stefan and his team have created a strong platform to lead the consolida- tion in the fragmented global food sector”, Mr Gottesman said. “The Iglo acquisition is performing as expected and we are excited about other potential acquisition opportunities that meet our criteria of being leaders in niche markets and having a long history of strong free cash flow generation.
“The momentum we have achieved thus far in 2015 has us well positioned to achieve meaningful long-term growth both organically as well as through prudent and complementary M&A opportunities.”
Nomad raised $485m from an initial public offering in April 2014 to fund acquisitions in the food and beverage industry. The group raised a further $330m in July to finance its dealmaking.
Nomad has won support from Bill Ackman, the founder of activist hedge fund Pershing Square, who revealed in June he had a 22pc stake.