On Wednesday, Canadian middle-market private equity firm TorQuest Partners, which manages C$3 billion in client assets, announced that it has completed the acquisition of VersaCold Logistics Services, one of Canada’s leading cold storage warehousing and food logistics companies. TorQuest partnered on the transaction with two of Canada’s leading pension funds: the Investment Management Corporation of Ontario (IMCO), which manages $70 billion in assets, and OPTrust, with net assets of $22 billion.
Price and other deal terms with the sellers, Canadian private equity real estate investor KingSett Capital and Ivanhoe Cambridge, were not made public.
The acquisition marks the first platform investment for TorQuest Partners Fund V, a $1.375 billion fund that was significantly oversubscribed upon its successful close in March 2020, having reached its hard cap of $1.1 billion for external commitments.
Per TorQuest, investors in Fund V are a “diverse group” of global institutional investors, including public and private pension plans, endowments, sovereign wealth funds, financial institutions, insurance companies and family offices.
Growing demand
VersaCold is Canada’s largest end-to-end supply chain solutions company focused exclusively on the handling of temperature sensitive products, primarily on behalf of food companies.
According to its website, VersaCold operates the largest temperature-sensitive logistics network in the country, with 31 temperature-controlled warehouses and distribution centers and a fleet of trucks providing local, regional, national and international transportation across Canada and the United States.
“We welcome this investment and look forward to working with our new partners to capitalize on growing demand for cold storage logistics solutions,” VersaCold CEO Mike Arcamone said in an official statement on the acquisition.”There will be no changes to the day-to-day operations as a result of the transaction and we remain fully committed to giving our customers the very best end-to-end supply chain solution available.”
“We are excited to be partnering on this investment with the VersaCold team,” said TorQuest partner Jonathan Fraser. “VersaCold is an attractive business with significant growth potential, and we look forward to capitalizing on the company’s recent success by continuing to leverage its strategic locations, commitment to food safety and outstanding customer service.”
Cold lang syne
It’s been a hot year for deals involving cold storage. In October, Atlanta’s Americold, the world’s largest publicly traded cold storage REIT, acquired the world’s fourth largest temperature-controlled warehouser, Agro Merchants Group, from a group of investors led by private alts manager Oaktree Capital Management for $1.74 billion.
In September, Lineage Logistics of Washington, which owns and operators over 1.9 billion cubic feet of cold capacity across more than 32 facilities in 13 countries, raised $1.6 billion in funding from a roster of deep-pocketed institutional investors, including Canada’s Oxford Properties.
In August, Tennessee’s Cryoport, which specializes in cold storage logistics for the life sciences industry, made not one but two major acquisitions in the space of five days, buying French cold storage logistics player CRYOPDP and cryogenic freezer maker MVE Biological Solutions with funding provided by (surprise!) Blackstone Group.
