Linpac Integration Director (M&A Integration – secondary packaging sector)

Background
A UK-based private equity owned company, active mainly across Northern Europe as well as Turkey and Brazil, with factories based in the UK, France, Spain, Germany, Turkey and Brazil, acquired a French-based company in the same industry whose commercial strength was focused on France, Benelux and Mediterranean markets including North Africa and some export markets further afield, with production plants in France and Spain, with the aim of achieving strong pan-European presence to better serve their international scale, grow sales through cross-selling and achieve economies of scale.

Ability to Integrate into Client Company
Due Diligence revealed the lack of in-house skill, experience and resource to plan, prepare and lead the business integration. A team
consisting in one Integration Director (as interim member of the company’s Executive team), a small programme management office
team and ad hoc interim resources in HR, Finance and IT support organised, led, coached and directed the integration workstreams
throughout the programme; this required fluency in English, French and German.

Impact on Business
Revised organised structure in UK, France, Benelux, Iberia, Italy and Germany were local sales and distribution companies were merged in each country. Integrated product portfolio, streamlined production facilities, revised manufacturing footprint, integrated IT system
(migrated to IFS).
Achievement of Objectives
The key objective was to integrate the two companies realising the budgeted synergies without any significant adverse impact to on-going
business. At the end of the integration, the business had exceeded it’s budgeted sales of €402.8m and it’s budgeted EBITDA of €41.5m .

Working Style
Stakeholder management and a good understanding of the diversity of business cultures were essential in bringing together two organisation that had such diverse working styles and history. A great number of workshops and group discussion were organised and facilitated to allow thorough mutual understanding and shared learning, to promote acceptance for change and the roll-out of the new organisation, culture and ways of working.

Leadership/Management Skills
Focused on communicating for clarity and unity of vision, “listening” to manage issues proactively, clear accountabilities in each workstream for the programme’s deliverables, detailed planning, budgeting and programme management to ensure progress and prevent
deviations from plan during the execution of the programme during 12 months.