New Mountain Capital Acquires RedPrairie

I wonder if there is similarity to what happened in the housing market not so long ago, when one private equity firm buys a business from another private equity firm?

Individuals bought houses to flip and when the market crashed they where stuck with an asset that was not worth what they paid.

Aivars Lode

 

New Mountain Capital Acquires RedPrairie

February 23, 2010

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RedPrairie Holding, Inc., a logistics consultancy company based in Milwaukee, has agreed to be acquired by New Mountain Capital, L.L.C., a New York-based private equity firm, for an undisclosed amount. The company, owned by Francisco Partners, filed for a $172.5 million IPO in November 2009. The company had approximately $194 million in revenue for the first nine months of 2009, and net income of $12.45 million. Francisco Partners acquired RedPrairie in 2005, and currently holds an 89.7% equity position.
Press release:
RedPrairie Holding, Inc., a productivity solutions provider, announced today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by a fund affiliated with New Mountain Capital, L.L.C., a leading private equity firm. This acquisition will enable RedPrairie to accelerate its already rapid growth rate while enhancing its commitment to customer success.

"RedPrairie has a strong vision, proven set of solutions and talented management team. I believe RedPrairie and New Mountain Capital will be a great combination. I wish them continued success."
"Our objective is to be the leading provider of productivity solutions for manufacturers, distributors and retailers," says Mike Mayoras, RedPrairie CEO. "Our relationship with New Mountain Capital will allow us to reach our strategic goals quickly, efficiently and with certainty. We believe there are significant opportunities to provide more value to our customer base by expanding our product portfolio and entering new markets."
Alok Singh, Managing Director of New Mountain Capital, states, "We are delighted at the prospect of being able to add RedPrairie to our family of companies. They have consistently, over their long history, been committed to the success of their customers. We aim to work closely with RedPrairie's management team and help them accelerate their growth and strategic development, making them an even more valued partner to their customer base."
Says David R. Golob, Chairman of the RedPrairie Board of Directors and Partner at Francisco Partners, "RedPrairie has a strong vision, proven set of solutions and talented management team. I believe RedPrairie and New Mountain Capital will be a great combination. I wish them continued success."
About New Mountain Capital
New Mountain Capital is a New York-based private equity firm investing for long-term capital appreciation through direct investment in growth equity transactions, leveraged acquisitions, and management buyouts. The Firm currently manages private and public equity funds with approximately $8.5 billion in aggregate capital commitments. New Mountain seeks out the highest-quality growth leaders in carefully selected industry sectors and then works intensively with management to build the value of these companies. For more information on New Mountain Capital, please visit www.newmountaincapital.com.
ABOUT REDPRAIRIE
RedPrairie delivers productivity solutions to help companies around the world in three categories - workforce, inventory and transportation. RedPrairie provides these solutions to manufacturers, distributors and retailers looking to support business strategies that increase revenue, reduce costs and create competitive advantage.
With over 20 global offices and solutions that are installed at more than 34,000 customer sites in over 40 countries, companies trust RedPrairie workforce, inventory and transportation solutions to deliver an increase in productivity - with the flexibility to adapt as business needs change.
At RedPrairie, we understand today's operational demands and we're committed to delivering solutions that work. We're committed to delivering solutions for the real world.

The Abiding Faith Of Warm-ongers

Thanks Mac for the article. An interesting perspective on global warming. Particularly the last paragraph about solar flares. In a documentary about space exploration they discussed how Skylab fell back to earth in the 70's as the outer atmosphere was warmed by solar flares. This caused the atmosphere to rise upto Skylab and then gravity took over and pulled it back to earth.

Aivars Lode

 

The Abiding Faith Of Warm-ongers

 Posted 12/22/2010 07:07 PM ET

Freezing weather: Just another example of global warming? View Enlarged Image

Climate: Nothing makes fools of more people than trying to predict the weather. Whether in Los Angeles or London, recent predictions have gone crazily awry. Global warming? How about mini ice age?
The sight of confused and angry travelers stuck in airports across Europe because of an arctic freeze that has settled across the continent isn't funny. Sadly, they've been told for more than a decade now that such a thing was an impossibility — that global warming was inevitable, and couldn't be reversed.
This is a big problem for those who see human-caused global warming as an irreversible result of the Industrial Revolution's reliance on carbon-based fuels. Based on global warming theory — and according to official weather forecasts made earlier in the year — this winter should be warm and dry. It's anything but. Ice and snow cover vast parts of both Europe and North America, in one of the coldest Decembers in history.
A cautionary tale? You bet. Prognosticators who wrote the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, global warming report in 2007 predicted an inevitable, century-long rise in global temperatures of two degrees or more. Only higher temperatures were foreseen. Moderate or even lower temperatures, as we're experiencing now, weren't even listed as a possibility.
Since at least 1998, however, no significant warming trend has been noticeable. Unfortunately, none of the 24 models used by the IPCC views that as possible. They are at odds with reality.
Karl Popper, the late, great philosopher of science, noted that for something to be called scientific, it must be, as he put it, "falsifiable." That is, for something to be scientifically true, you must be able to test it to see if it's false. That's what scientific experimentation and observation do. That's the essence of the scientific method.
Unfortunately, the prophets of climate doom violate this idea. No matter what happens, it always confirms their basic premise that the world is getting hotter. The weather turns cold and wet? It's global warming, they say. Weather turns hot? Global warming. No change? Global warming. More hurricanes? Global warming. No hurricanes? You guessed it.
Nothing can disprove their thesis. Not even the extraordinarily frigid weather now creating havoc across most of the Northern Hemisphere. The Los Angeles Times, in a piece on the region's strangely wet and cold weather, paraphrases Jet Propulsion Laboratory climatologist Bill Patzert as saying, "In general, as the globe warms, weather conditions tend to be more extreme and volatile."

Got that? No matter what the weather, it's all due to warming. This isn't science; it's a kind of faith. Scientists go along and even stifle dissent because, frankly, hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants are at stake. But for the believers, global warming is the god that failed.
Why do we continue to listen to warmists when they're so wrong? Maybe it's because their real agenda has nothing to do with climate change at all. Earlier this month, attendees of a global warming summit in Cancun, Mexico, concluded, with virtually no economic or real scientific support, that by 2020 rich nations need to transfer $100 billion a year to poor nations to help them "mitigate" the adverse impacts of warming.
This is what global warming is really about — wealth redistribution by people whose beliefs are basically socialist. It has little or nothing to do with climate. If it did, we might pay more attention to Piers Corbyn, a little-known British meteorologist and astrophysicist who has a knack for correctly predicting weather changes. Indeed, as London's Mayor Boris Johnson recently noted, "He seems to get it right about 85% of the time."
How does he do it? Unlike the U.N. and government forecasters, Corbyn pays close attention to solar cycles that, as it turns out, correlate very closely to changes in climate. Not only are we not headed for global warming, Corbyn says, we may be entering a "mini ice age" similar to the one that took place from 1450 A.D. to 1850 A.D.
We don't know if Corbyn's right or not. But given his record, he deserves as much attention as the warm-mongers whose goal is not to arrive at the truth but to reorganize society in a radical way.

A great website for factual graphical representation of data

http://www.gapminder.org/   


Thanks Ron 


Aivars Lode

Price of Silver Soaring

So how long before it crash's?

Aivars Lode

 

Price of Silver Soaring

Investor-Fueled 74% Gains Dwarf Gold; Race to Open Mines

By CAROLYN CUI And ROBERT GUY MATTHEWS

BIG CREEK, Idaho—An unexpected surge in investor demand is sending silver prices soaring—and speculators and mining companies are digging in.
In the past four months, the metal has upended forecasts, rising 51% to a series of 30-year highs, before inflation. Silver closed Thursday at $29.31 a troy ounce, up from $16.822 at the beginning of 2010.
Among the four major precious metals—the others being gold, platinum and palladium—silver is up 74% this year, on track to be the second-best performing commodity after palladium, which is up 86%. Gold, by contrast, is up 26% and copper just under 28%.

View Full Image

Associated Press

Silver's surprising rise has spurred increased mining activity in places including Silver Valley, Idaho, pictured.

Prices are rising despite oversupply and a lackluster recovery in industrial demand. Many analysts expected those factors would keep a lid on prices in 2010. What they didn't expect was an overwhelming flow of money into the market from investors eager to ride a commodities rally.
"This is a story almost entirely about investment," says Stephen Briggs, senior metals strategist at BNP Paribas.
The global silver appetite partly reflects world economic improvements. Investors from the U.S. to China turned to "hard" assets such as copper and other commodities in part as a hedge against inflation worries. Silver benefits from a dual role as industrial commodity and precious metal.
Here in the mountain-ringed Silver Valley, historically one of the world's largest silver production regions, workers are busy punching through rocks to open passages in the Crescent Silver Mine, which closed more than a dozen years ago when prices of silver dipped to $5 to $6 an ounce.
Even if prices retreat to $15 an ounce—a level seen as recently as early this year—some prospectors say they can break even, which means development will continue. "I think we are starting a new era in mining here," says Greg Stewart, president of United Mining Group, which has an 80% interest in the Crescent Silver Mine.
Exchange-traded funds backed with silver have enabled investors to invest in a market that traditionally was harder to participate in. The largest silver ETF, the $10.2 billion iShares Silver Trust, has seen a $1.1 billion net inflow for the first 11 months of this year. In recent months, concerns about inflation, the European debt crisis and the U.S. Federal Reserve's recent moves to boost the economy have driven investors to hard assets, also benefitting silver prices.
The craze has reached the coin market. In November, silver American Eagle coins sold by the U.S. Mint amounted to 4.26 million ounces, a monthly record in the agency's history.
Silver's reliance on investors to prop up the price could cause it to tumble suddenly. "When investor support for the metal fades, the downside is going to be pretty substantial," says Credit Suisse analyst Tom Kendall. He forecasts an average price of $30.10 per troy ounce next year as "a lot of factors that have led people to buy silver would still be there in 2011." But he cautions, "The number is only going to be achievable as long as fresh money keeps moving in."
Silver's all-time high was set in January 1980 at $48.70 an ounce, or $129.32 when adjusted for inflation.

This year investors are expected to pile a record $4.5 billion into the silver market, accounting for 24% of the world's total demand, says GFMS Ltd., a metals consulting firm in London. That's the highest level, in dollar terms, in decades. Silver's relatively small market size—$19 billion compared with $170 billion for gold—has also played a role in amplifying the impact of investors, according to GFMS.
The strength in silver prices has prompted a flurry of development around the globe and pushed anticipated production in 2010 to 733.2 million ounces, up 3.3% from 2009 levels, and up 14% since 2006.
Silver has some inherent appeal due to its industrial use in electronics, silverware and coins. And reserves are limited. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, there are fewer years of U.S. silver production left in the ground than any other precious metal including gold.
The recent price increase has been fueled by other factors in addition to investor interest. For instance, China recently abolished an exports tax rebate on metals. That has resulted in a 59% decline in silver exports.
China is a major silver producer and was a big exporter until 14 months ago. Strong demand there, coupled with the elimination of the tax break to protect domestic natural resources, have led Chinese producers to slash exports.
Concerns are lingering over excess supply. The market is set to see a surplus of 64.4 million ounces in 2010, says Barclays Capital, which could curb prices. This year's surplus will be 16% smaller than 2009's but much higher than previous years.
Overall, silver production has been rising steadily in the past five years, with most of the growth coming from mines in Mexico, Latin America and Australia. Gold Corp., a Vancouver-based mining company, expects to more than triple output at its mine in Mexico, Penasquito, which is expected to produce 10 million ounces of silver in 2011, up from about 3 million ounces in 2009, according to GFMS.
Another new mine, Coeur d'Alene Mines Corporation's Palmarejo silver and gold mine in Mexico, is also ramping up to produce 9 million ounces annually. And BHP Billiton, which owns one of the largest silver mines in the world, Cannington, is looking to increase production and extend the life of the mine, located in Australia.
So-called junior miners like United Mining Group, which has an interest in the Crescent Silver Mine, are much smaller than mining giants like BHP and Rio Tinto. They often lack the capital or expertise to run a mine, which requires costly equipment and infrastructure. Instead, their geologists often scout projects and then sell an interest in them to larger companies.
United Mining Group is issuing shares on the Toronto Stock Exchange to raise up to $8 million to develop the Crescent Silver Mine, which is more than 90 years old. Located in Idaho's Silver Valley—an area peppered with colorfully named mines like Lucky Friday, Sunshine and Bunker Hill—it is expected to begin production in early 2012, with output just over 1 million ounces.
"The whole industry is like feast or famine," says Mr. Stewart of United Mining.
Write to Carolyn Cui at carolyn.cui@wsj.com and Robert Guy Matthews at robertguy.matthews@wsj.com

Cerberus and Chrysler

I worked on a deal with Cerberus and posted about their 

acquisition of Chysler and wondered what 

incongruity they had discovered. Well it was not their 

best deal however they did not lose.

Aivars Lode

The Term Sheet by Dan Primack

Tuesday -- December 21, 2010

Random Ramblings
If you do a Google search for Cerberus and Chrysler, your top 
result will be a Forbes story whose header is: “A firm notorious
for its secrecy gets a very public black eye.”
My guess is that might soon change a bit...
Cerberus this morning announced that it has agreed to sell
Chrysler Financial to TD Bank for $6.3 billion. From a return 
perspective, this means that Cerberus actually is nearing 
break-even on its original investment. Here’s how it works out:
Cerberus led a $7.4 billion acquisition of Chrysler from Daimler 
in 2007, which included both Chrysler’s auto-making and auto-finance
units. The private equity firm’s actual investment was $1.3 billion, with
the remainder coming from co-investors and lenders. For context, 
it was the firm’s largest-ever check.
Chrysler’s auto-making unit went bust last year, with Cerberus 
contributing its equity to the government-backed bankruptcy. 
But Cerberus held on to Chrysler Finance, which has since 
benefited from such macro as increases in car resale values 
(CRVs). Now it’s selling the unit to TD Bank for $6.3 billion in cash.
That would still put the overall buyout underwater by $1.1 billion, 
except that Cerberus actually isn’t selling all of Chrysler Financial. 
Instead, it’s holding onto select assets – including a unit set up to 
do foreclosures and one related to insurance (seems TD wanted
to get the deal done fast, rather than wait to figure out additional 
dispositions). My understanding is that Cerberus values those 
excluded assets at approximately $940 million.
As such, the total cash-on-cash loss appears to be less than 
1% of the deal's original value. Still a lousy deal, to be sure, 
but not anything close to the disaster that most folks had
assumed it to be…