Nutun Australia falls into local hands as Allegro snaps it up for $120m

Outsourcing specialist Nutun Australia has today been acquired by Allegro Funds in a deal worth roughly $120 million, giving the Sydney-based private equity firm access to 900-plus staff across Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.

Based in Melbourne, Nutun Australia is a growing provider of specialised business process outsourcing (BPO) services for a longstanding blue-chip customer base, which includes some of the nation’s largest banks, insurers, utilities and telecommunication providers.

BPO is the practice of contracting standard business functions to a third party, and can cover a broad range of tasks like payroll, accounting, customer support, social media marketing and more.

The deal values Nutun Australia at approximately $120 million on an enterprise value basis, and will see the company fall into local hands after being run by its parent company, Nutun South Africa.

Allegro managing director Jeffrey Largier says the company sees a compelling opportunity for Nutun Australia to broaden the range and capabilities of its service offering in Australia, New Zealand and abroad, and will rapidly build these through organic investment and acquisition activity.

“Nutun Australia is a profitable and growing business and we see a great opportunity to continue to build its capabilities through organic growth, further investment in technology and industry consolidation,” Largier says.

“Allegro has a strong track record in corporate carveouts and we look forward to partnering with Nutun Australia’s team to build and broaden its BPO product offering.”

Founded in 2004, Allegro is a Sydney-based investment manager with more than $4 billion of assets under management across Australia and New Zealand. Since its inception, the firm has acquired 27 businesses and exited 18 investments,including the Australian operations of Pizza Hut.

The Australian arm of Nutun will continue to work closely with Nutun South Africa under a long-term strategic partnership, enabling both businesses to continue service existing clients, build new client partnerships while sharing knowledge, IP and collaborating on multi-geography solutions for their clients.

The firm has a broad service offering including credit collections, CX, insurance claims recovery, insource solutions and legal services and trades through its brands recoveriescorp, Mason Black + Mendelsons and Nutun.

CEO Nicholas Harrak will continue lead the Australian business supported by the existing experienced management team.

“We are excited to partner with Allegro to grow our business and, together, build a leading regional BPO provider with a broad range of integrated service offerings for our existing and future client partners,” Harrak said.

Allegro was advised by Clifford Chance, McKinsey, PwC, FTI and Skye Capital on the deal, while Nutun Australia was advised by Miles Advisory.

The transaction is expected to be completed in mid-April.