Iver, Buckinghamshire, 12th April 2010: DX Group, the UK and Ireland’s largest independent mail and courier company, has today announced the agreement of a capital refinancing and a management buy-in led by Petar Cvetkovic and David Hoare. As part of the deal, DX Group’s main shareholder, the private equity house Candover Partners Limited, as manager of the Candover 2005 Fund, is to inject fresh equity of £15m.
Petar Cvetkovic and David Hoare are respectively the former CEO and Chairman of Target Express, the express delivery business they successfully and profitably grew into an industry leading carrier. Effective from 12th April, current Chairman, David Mitchell, will hand over the reins to David Hoare. CEO, John Coghlan, will resume his previous position of Non-Executive Director and hand over to Petar Cvetkovic.
John Coghlan said: “Petar and David bring to the management team a huge amount of experience and we are delighted to welcome them to the DX Group board.
“DX Group has weathered an unprecedentedly tough trading period over the last 18 months, but has remained profitable and cash-generative. Now, with the support of Candover and our banking group, we have a strengthened balance sheet and the freedom to push ahead.”
Petar Cvetkovic said: “David and I are very pleased to join the DX Group, a company which we’ve consistently held in high regard. The business has a solid, profitable base and, in the coming months and years, we will seek to build upon its strong reputation in the market place.”
Mark Dickinson, director of Candover, said: “We are extremely grateful to David Mitchell, John Coghlan and their team for steering DX through a very difficult economic period and maintaining both market share and profitability. The refinancing is a very positive outcome for both DX Group and Candover, and we’re delighted to back the management with further fresh capital. In welcoming David and Petar to the board, DX is now well placed to exploit the long term opportunities present in this sector.”
ENDS
For further information, please contact:
Andrew Baud, Tala PR, andrew.baud@talapr.co.uk or 07775 715775
Note to editors:
DX Group is the largest independent mail and courier company in the UK
DX is the only mail company to have its own end-to-end operation that is not reliant on Royal Mail for any part of the collection or delivery service. For 35 years, the company has provided business customers with a range of reliable, secure and cost effective services that are a genuine alternative to Royal Mail.
DX was borne out of the postal strikes in the 1970s, when the legal profession took matters into its own hands in order to prevent future industrial actions causing further interruption to their business. Today, many thousands of businesses and government agencies that rely on the timely delivery of paperwork now ‘DX’ their mail, rather than post it.
DX is the only provider to have its own end-to-end operation that is not reliant on Royal Mail. It offers businesses and the public sector a genuine alternative for the next day delivery of letters, packets and parcels.
Biographies
David Hoare is currently Chairman of V.Ships, the leading supplier of crew and technical services to the Shipping Industry. He is also Chairman of Duncton Plc and Chairman designate of the Teenage Cancer Trust. Over the past 10 years he has been Chairman of Virgin Express, Fairline Boats, Sparck Hypotheken and Target Express.
Petar Cvetkovic. After graduating in Business Studies, Petar became a multi-drop driver in London. During his 27 years in the logistics industry, Petar has worked in parcels, contract and shared-user distribution as well as supply chain and international logistics. Petar is the former MD of DPDS Logistics, and Norbert Dentressangle in the UK and latterly CEO of Target Express and MD of City Link. Petar is married with 2 children and enjoys playing and watching various sports.