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Verdant Capital has advised a leading United Kingdom (UK) private equity firm on the sale of Biyinzika Poultry International Limited
Johannesburg, South Africa | THE INDEPENDENT | Verdant Capital has advised a leading UK private equity firm on the sale of Biyinzika Poultry International Limited (“BPIL”), a vertically integrated poultry business in Uganda, to an investor consortium including a US single-family office and a regional industry executive. The sale represented a 100% interest in BPIL.
BPIL was founded in 1990 as a poultry breeder farm and has grown steadily over the years to establish itself as a key player in the Ugandan poultry industry. It is a leading supplier of day-old chicks, poultry feeds, broilers, and branded and unbranded dressed chicken. It trades under brand names, including Pearl Chicken and Biyinzika Feeds.
The transaction reinforces Verdant Capital’s position as a leading advisor to private equity clients in Africa and builds on its market-leading sector competence in advising on transactions in the food and agri-business sector.
In 2023 alone, Verdant Capital has completed three transactions in the food and agri-business sector. The transaction builds on Verdant Capital’s leading pan-African M&A league table positions in recent years, including in 2022, its rankings of fourth and first in the DealMakers pan-African and East African league tables, respectively.
Terms for the transaction were not disclosed.
Biyinzika history
In 2014, a venture capital fund known as 8 Miles provided equity to Samuel Mukasa’s Biyinzika for their poultry business to expand. The company was renamed Biyinzika International.
The company 8 Miles eventually took over the management of the business, compelling Mukasa to open Biyinzika Enterprises, which is now struggling with loans.
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APO
So, this Ugandan entrepreneur has been faithfully operating since 1990 and learning and grown his business when most of us were green on business, when people would see it as a miracle to go buy a shirt from nairobi and sell it in Kampala.
Yes, there could be a thing or two about overtrading perhaps, but let’s not dismiss the effects of like COVID-19 and stuff like the regional wars. Some of these things have hit hard at the unexpected time.
The irony here is that someone else is coming in to takeover that hard earned foothold and then as a nation, there’s that element of an investor who has to repatriate earnings and also control much of our food security 100% and of course these things come with many other parameters.
In my personal view, if the likes of Basajjabalaba & Bitature can be bailed out (and many others who are not in the forefront of the news), why would we be glad to start via that route for an indigenous Ugandan business?