One Equity Partners, a leading middle market private equity firm, today announced the signing of a definitive agreement to sell the operating subsidiaries of Sonneborn Holdings L.P., a global leader in specialty hydrocarbon chemicals, to a subsidiary of HollyFrontier Corporation (NYSE: HFC), an independent petroleum refiner and marketer, for $655 million. The transaction is expected to close in 2019, subject to regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions.
Founded in 1903, Sonneborn manufactures highly purified white oil, petrolatum, microcrystalline wax, sodium sulfonate and compressor lubricants for personal care, pharmaceutical, food, polymer and metal working applications of 500+ global customers. The Company is headquartered in Parsippany, NJ and employs approximately 360 people worldwide with three production sites in the U.S. and the Netherlands.
“We greatly appreciate the opportunity to partner with Sonneborn management team lead by Paul Raymond, CEO, and the Board of Directors led by Jac Nasser as Chairman. The strategic initiatives that Sonneborn undertook during our partnership have clearly solidified its global leadership position,” said David Han, Senior Managing Director of OEP.
“We would like to thank OEP and the Board of Directors for their unwavering support of the growth initiatives that we identified together to capitalize globally on new market opportunities enabled by improvements in our manufacturing capacity and supply chain,” said Paul Raymond III, President and CEO of Sonneborn. “We look forward to continue delivering significant value for our customers as we enter the next phase of our growth.”
Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC is acting as financial advisor and Baker McKenzie is serving as legal counsel to Sonneborn in connection with this transaction.
About One Equity Partners
OEP is a middle-market private equity firm focused on the industrial, healthcare, and technology sectors in North America and Europe. The firm builds market-leading companies by identifying and executing transformative business combinations. OEP is a trusted partner with a differentiated investment process, a broad and senior team, and an established track record generating long-term value for its partners. Since 2001, the firm has completed more than 180 transactions worldwide. OEP, founded in 2001, spun out of JP Morgan in 2015. The firm has offices in New York, Chicago, and Frankfurt. For more information, please visit www.oneequity.com.
One Equity Partners – Middle Market Private Equity www.oneequity.com
About One Equity Partners
One Equity Partners is a middle market private equity firm with over $5 billion in assets under management focused on transformative combinations within the industrial, healthcare and technology sectors in North America and Europe.
About Sonneborn
For more than 100 years, Sonneborn has been setting industry standards the world over for the finest possible high purity specialty hydrocarbons in Personal Care, Pharmaceutical, Baking & Food, Agriculture, HI&I, Polymers and many other applications. With manufacturing facilities in North America and Europe, Sonneborn is the world’s only high purity specialty hydrocarbon producer that offers this global reach of expertise and depth of experience.
About HollyFrontier Corporation
HollyFrontier Corporation, headquartered in Dallas, Texas, is an independent petroleum refiner and marketer that produces high value light products such as gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel and other specialty products. HollyFrontier operates through its subsidiaries a 135,000 barrels per stream day (“bpsd”) refinery located in El Dorado, Kansas, a 125,000 bpsd refinery in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a 100,000 bpsd refinery located in Artesia, New Mexico, a 52,000 bpsd refinery located in Cheyenne, Wyoming and a 45,000 bpsd refinery in Woods Cross, Utah. HollyFrontier markets its refined products principally in the Southwest U.S., the Rocky Mountains extending into the Pacific Northwest and in other neighboring Plains states. In addition, HollyFrontier, through its subsidiary, owns Petro-Canada Lubricants Inc., whose Mississauga, Ontario facility produces 15,600 barrels per day of base oils and other specialized lubricant products, and owns a 57% interest and a non-economic general partner interest in Holly Energy Partners, L.P.
