Scottish insurance broker Giles Insurance Brokers has acquired Birmingham-based Midland Risk Management following a £500 million private equity investment in the company.
MRM is just one of three bolt-ons secured by the Glasgow-based company in the past week, the others being commercial lines specialist Robinson Leslie of Chester and broker DS Howell of Tonyrefail in Wales.
MRM, one of the largest remaining independent commercial brokers in the Birmingham area, was founded in Acocks Green 25 years ago by partners Mike Le Resche and Gary Carroll.
The two founders were later joined by Peter Jones and all three senior partners are taking key roles within Giles following the acquisition.
Giles chief executive Chris Giles said: "The significant investment made in Giles by our private equity partner Charterhouse has given us the means to realise the company's potential and really escalate our acquisition drive."
Sean Finnegan, managing director of Giles' Central Region, added that MRM was a good fit and would add value in years to come.
"The team in Birmingham will remain intact and we have ambitions to grow the staff numbers in the Midlands once it becomes fully integrated under the Giles umbrella," he said.
Giles added that it had ambitions to increase its Midlands portfolio and was currently in negotiations with a number of other potential acquisitions.
"We expect to be in a position to confirm further additions to the Giles group in the near future," said Mr Finnegan.
Mr Le Resche said: "This deal will see our clients benefit from being serviced by a growing, like-minded, customerfocused UK broker, which shares similar values to Midland Risk Management."
Mr Carroll added that customers would benefit from the economies of scale which come with channelling a business to a larger broker with a national reach. But he stressed that its customer service would not change.
"We look forward to working with Giles and expect to grow our client base through the hard work and dedication of the team," he said.
Giles Insurance Brokers was itself recently acquired by private equity firm Charterhouse Capital Partners. The deal saw Charterhouse and Bank of Scotland Corporate provide the firm with £500 million in order to fund the acquisition of smaller commercial brokers across the UK.
As a result, Giles is now one of the UK's fastest growing commercial insurance brokers whose strategy is to build a business with £1 billion of gross written premium.
