Successful acquisition financing for the dental group

Challenge:

Founders Berend Wauters and Vincent Mazairac are convinced that through Atlas Dental Care, they are making the practices stand much stronger. In addition, more and more practices are being sold because the owners are retiring. Young dentists often do not want or are unable to completely take over these practices themselves. The increasingly complex regulations and administrative pressure are also opposed to many dentists, so they prefer to be dentists rather than entrepreneurs. Through a successful Buy & Build Strategy Atlas Dental Care has successfully taken over a dozen practices in Breda, Eindhoven, Weert, Tiel, the 's-Hertogenbosch area... and now Antwerp too!

Via via via, the two founders encountered an acquisition opportunity in Antwerp. An ideal case for exploring the Belgian landscape and extra fun for Berend because (as a Belgian) he can 'finally' play a home match. “We have a fantastic financial colleague in our company, but of course he specializes in the Dutch business. I myself worked as a business banker at Belfius but the financing landscape is simply evolving very rapidly. We quickly realized that we wanted to do this takeover in a professional and good way. After that, it also takes time to submit a credit file to the bank, time that is valuable,” says Berend.

Approach:

Considering them first takeover in Belgium was, we set a timeline together and told them what to expect. Not only in preparing the takeover itself, but of course also with the necessary financing to close this deal, we helped Berend and Vincent.

We put together a sophisticated plan, financing the takeover as much as possible with the funds generated by Antwerp practice. The focus was on bank financing supplemented with a guarantee from the European Guarantee Fund in order to limit the share of personal input. This ensures that Atlas Dental Care can use those funds for its own activities or to finance other acquisitions in the future.

Result:

Our team found the necessary bank financing to close the deal at attractive terms with ING. This is how the first Belgian acquisition of Atlas Dental Care became a reality! Berend and Vincent will continue to focus on the Netherlands, but will also keep all options open in Belgium from now on. “So if someone has a golden tip, they can always come to us,” laughs Berend.