Genuine Parts Co., a diversified distributor that owns the NAPA auto parts brand and sells mainly to automotive repair shops, is about to expand across Europe.
Genuine Parts, based in Atlanta, said today it has agreed to pay about $2 billion to acquire London-based Alliance Automotive Group, which sells more than 100,000 parts online and through more than 1,800 stores across the United Kingdom, France and Germany. It said it expects the deal to close in the fourth quarter of this year.
Alliance Automotive Group, or AAG, operates the e-commerce sites Drivista-shop.com, which sells to repair facilities, and Drivista.com, which connects repair facilities with their customers. AAG also sells through 300 company-owned and 1,500 affiliated auto parts stores. Its customer base consists of about 30,000 repair facilities. It operates under brands including Groupauto, Precisium and Gef’Auto in France; Groupauto, UAN and FPS in the U.K.; and Alliance Automotive Group in Germany.
Genuine Parts said AAG is expected to generate $1.7 billion in 2017 revenue, or about 11% of the $15.34 billion in net sales Genuine Parts reported in 2016. For the second quarter ended June 30, Genuine Parts said it posted record revenue of $4.1 billion; for the six months ended June 30, it reported net sales of $8.006 billion, up 5.1% from $7.618 billion in the year-earlier period. It doesn’t break out e-commerce sales, but the company has said that e-commerce plays an important part in its growth strategy.
“We are excited to combine with AAG and enter the European markets with critical scale and a leading market position in the automotive aftermarket,” said Genuine Parts CEO Paul Donahue. “AAG is poised to contribute significant sales growth and earnings accretion to Genuine Parts.”
Genuine Parts has an agreement to purchase AAG from investment firm Blackstone Group and AAG’s co-founders.
The other businesses Genuine Parts owns include NapaOnline.com, the e-commerce site for NAPA Auto Parts Stores; MotionIndustries.com, the online arm of industrial parts distributor Motion Industries Inc.; SPRdealerservices.com, a customer portal of office supplies distributor S.P. Richards Co.; and EIS-inc.com, the site for electrical products distributor EIS Inc.
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