goetzpartners advised Dieter Braun GmbH

Fortlane Partners advised Dieter Braun GmbH (“Dieter Braun”), a solution provider for cable assembly and lighting technology headquartered in Bayreuth and a portfolio company of publicly-listed private equity investor Deutsche Beteiligungs AG (“DBAG”), on the acquisition of the international system supplier of connectors and heat sinks ASSMANN WSW Group ("ASSMANN WSW").

With the group addition, Dieter Braun is pursuing a targeted expansion of its product and service offering mainly to non-automotive customers and further strengthens its geographical presence and customer proximity in attractive markets, such as North America. As a system supplier mainly supplying its products to industrial clients and distributors outside the automotive industry, ASSMANN WSW will contribute its competence to develop customer-specific applications to the newly established group of companies.

ASSMANN WSW is a family business, majority-owned by Managing Directors Bernd Weidenhammer and Frank Walter alongside the founding Assmann family. Both Managing Directors will become shareholders in the Dieter Braun group going forward.

“Through the acquisition, Braun will significantly broaden and strengthen its position by diversifying its sales market beyond the automotive industry,” says Dr. Andreas Brand, CEO of Dieter Braun, explaining the background of the transaction. "And we will benefit from the established sales structure of our future sister company in North America where we want to jointly grow as a first step."

Bernd Weidenhammer also emphasises the growth opportunities resulting from the transaction: “In the new constellation, we will be able to offer our customers in North America products that are produced at the Mexican site of Dieter Braun and thus meet the demand for local production”. The ASSMANN WSW Managing Director adds: “We will also offer Dieter Braun’s high-performance cable assembly capabilities to our customers in Europe.”

Fortlane Partners acted as sole M&A buy-side advisor to Dieter Braun. This transaction further demonstrates Fortlane Partners' ability to achieve outperforming results and underlines our competence as advisor of choice in the cable and wire harness as well as the wider industrials space.

About Dieter Braun
Founded in 1993, Dieter Braun is a specialist and solution provider for cable assembly and lighting technology for the automotive industry. Its products are used in electrical modules, e.g., in the switches of multi-function steering wheels, or connecting such modules with the vehicle’s main wiring harness. Besides its headquarters in Bayreuth, Dieter Braun operates production facilities in Czech Republic, Ukraine, Mexico, and China. Since January 2017, Dieter Braun is majority owned by DBAG Fund VI, an investment vehicle advised by Deutsche Beteiligungs AG. It generated a turnover of EUR 79m in 2021 while employing c. 1,400 employees.

About ASSMANN WSW
ASSMANN WSW, headquartered in Lüdenscheid, is a system supplier of connectors and heat sinks to industrial clients and distributors. The company was founded in 2005 as a spin-off of the connectors and heat sinks activities of Assmann Electronic GmbH, which has been majorly held by the two Managing Directors, Bernd Weidenhammer and Frank Walter, since then. ASSMANN WSW contributes a turnover of EUR 22m to the new group. Besides the distribution facility in the USA, the company has a production facility in Slovakia while a subsidiary in China organises the supply of critical components as well as their quality control. Altogether, ASSMANN WSW employs 80 employees worldwide.

Transaction team:

Christian Muthler
Managing Director
 

Markus Rosen
Director

Sven Langelahn
Associate

Lukas Falkenrodt
Analyst