Fletchers Group

In 2021, Fletchers Solicitors was acquired by Sun European Partners LLP, an experienced private equity firm driven by operational expertise and putting the customer at the heart of the business. As a 500-person strong law firm, coming off a record year and showing incredible resilience through a period of global adversity, the acquisition of Fletchers was an exciting entry into the legal services space for Sun Capital.

Fletchers Solicitors today, is one of the UK’s most respected and trusted law firms. Employing over 1000 people and specializing in medical negligence and personal injury, Fletchers Solicitors is part of Fletchers Group, which is home to a group of specialist medical negligence and personal injury companies and legal brands including Serious Injury Law, Minton Morrill, Cycle SOS, Biker SOS, Patient Claim Line and Blume, and its charitable arm, Fletchers Foundation.

The ambition for this Sun European and Fletchers partnership was to “accelerate its substantial historic growth through investment in technology as well as undertaking a buy and build in the legal services space” according to Alexander Wyndham, vice president at Sun European Partners.

The Fletchers team came to the table knowing that M&A was a great opportunity and had been gearing up for it, even before meeting with Sun, given the consolidation activity within this highly fragmented sector and the implications of COVID, so it was an ideal time to kick off the acquisition strategy.

Following a successful project between Sun European and Finquest, the Fletchers team were introduced to Finquest by Sun European Partners during the acquisition process as a solution to mapping and connecting with relevant targets.

Being highly focused on their strategic needs, aware that the market was highly fragmented, and operating a lean M&A function – the Fletchers team knew they needed more than a list of a few hundred targets that were simply ready to be acquired. They needed to focus on companies that would deliver on the strategic goal. So, partnering with Finquest who could comprehensively map and connect them to interested acquisition opportunities in the market that were a tight strategic fit, was a logical solution.

Being a highly fragmented market, the list of relevant companies delivered by the Finquest Research team was in the thousands.

Once Fletchers had narrowed this down to the area they wanted to concentrate on first, the Finquest Origination team set about contacting, interviewing, and presenting options back to the Fletchers team; and over a space of 6 weeks, they were introduced to dozens of viable and attractive businesses that met their strategic needs.

The Fletchers team said “[they] were a pleasure to deal with. Bringing real tenacity to the project. Nothing was too much trouble, and they had a very good understanding of the industry and the firms. The team came into their own on this stage of the process.”

The Finquest model allowed this lean M&A team to focus on the value-added work and concentrate on getting the deals done.

The comprehensive map of the market provided by Finquest formed the foundation on which the acquisition strategy could be built upon. Indeed, from this first project in 2021 alone, several LOIs were issued and 2 acquisitions have been made so far: Minton Morrill (September 2022) and Cycle SOS (May 2022).

Fast forward a couple of years and given the success of the first project, and the capabilities of the Finquest team and process, when it was time to proactively expand their search for additional acquisition opportunities, the Fletchers team knew exactly where to turn.

If you’d like to learn how you can use Finquest to find your next acquisition, please contact us here