By Greg Roumeliotis and Soyoung Kim
NEW YORK, May 1 (Reuters) – The private equity arm of OMERS,
one of Canada’s largest pension plans, has hired Barclays Plc
and Harris Williams & Co to explore a sale of United
States Infrastructure Corporation (USIC), three people familiar
with the matter said this week.
The Indianapolis-based infrastructure services company,
which maintains the underground cables of telecommunications,
power and water utilities, could be valued at around $800
million based on annual earnings before interest, tax,
depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of about $100 million,
the people said.
USIC and OMERS declined to comment, while spokespeople for
Barclays and Harris Williams did not respond to requests for
comments. The sources asked not to be named because the process
is not public.
The niche market for utility line-locating services was
valued by Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services at $1.6 billion
last year.
USIC was formed in 2008 when private equity firm Kohlberg &
Co acquired and merged two companies active in the underground
locating and marking service sector – SM&P; Utility Resources Inc
and Central Locating Service Ltd.
In just over a year, USIC’s EBITDA had grown by 65 percent,
according to Kohlberg’s website. In 2010, Kohlberg sold USIC to
OMERS Private Equity for an undisclosed amount. It was OMERS’
second private equity deal in the United States following its
acquisition of rail maintenance equipment company Nordco Inc in
2009.
OMERS Private Equity has over $6.5 billion of assets under
management and has been carrying out investments since 1987. In
2012, it posted returns of 19.2 percent, strongly outperforming
the total portfolio of OMERS, which reported a 10 percent
return. OMERS has total net assets of over $60 billion.
