How our partnership began

Credo invested in Konstel in 2019, together with a group of local founders in search of a financial partner for their buy-and-build ambition. Our mission was to build the #1 multi-local electrical installation group in Norway combining the agility, autonomy and local anchoring of smaller companies with the resources, bargaining power, community and system value of a group.

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The transformation

Konstel is a classic buy-and-build: rapid acquisitions, light-footed HQ with value-add shared services. Konstel’s positioning as the opposite of big corporates resonated well with founders. To deliver on this promise we needed to build a distributed business model with local autonomy, only light integration, but strong shared services to boost operations locally, enable growth and protect margins: financial control, digitalisation, marketing, sustainability, HR and of course purchasing. Konstel also became an independent acquisition machine with standardised execution models and partners. As so often, Credo made sure to rapidly build the right leadership, with a light group leadership and strong local leaders as the real heroes of the group. 9% organic growth and 10% EBITA margin is not bad for an ambitious buy-and-build like this.

Exit

In 2022, Konstel took the position as the leading multi-local electrical installation group in Norway, and the company received strong incoming interest from consolidators looking to enter the Norwegian market. We chose to sell to Nimlas Group, a Nordic installation group owned by the private equity firm KLAR Partners. Together, Nimlas Group and Konstel represent a strong strategic platform for further growth and value creation in the Nordics.