A year of success for FRP Corporate Finance

Building on a positive end to 2023, in 2024 our team supported businesses through continued challenging macro conditions and political uncertainty with the change of government and subsequent Budget.

In total our national team completed 101 transactions with a total aggregate deal value of over £1.8 billion. Furthermore, our debt advisory team raised over £0.75 billion of debt for clients to support transactions or refinance existing facilities.

In addition to our broad mix of deal completions, highlights from the year include:

• Acquisitions – 2 significant acquisitions in Cardiff and Newcastle, enhancing our regional outreach.
• Team Promotions – 16 promotions across our team, recognising their talent and commitment.
• New Partners – 5 new partners joined our team adding significant senior expertise to our growing regional teams and specialist services.
• Awards – 8 award wins including regional awards in the South-East, Solent, North-East, Central & East and Wales.

We continued to see good activity from Private Equity in 2024 – with over 50% of our closed deals involving Private Equity investment.

As predicted at the end of last year, Private Equity have played a key role in activity in 2024 following a period of subdued activity in 2023, where preference was given to investment into buy and build opportunities, rather than large platform acquisitions.

With significant dry powder to deploy we have seen Private Equity actively returning to the M&A market in 2024 – broadening their investment portfolios with new acquisitions in both existing and new sectors, divesting of mature assets, and continuing to implement buy and build strategies.

In 2024 we saw strong activity levels in;

• Business Services (27 per cent), particularly professional services, including accountancy, consultancy, and recruitment.
• Technology (19 per cent), including software, Fintech, cyber security and fraud prevention.
• Industrials & Manufacturing (17 per cent) including energy and building supplies and engineering.

In addition, we have closed transactions in sectors where FRP Corporate Finance have significant prior experience including property management, automotive, travel and consumer & retail.