Category Archives: KCB

M&A Moment: July 2017

Various recent deals in the last few weeks and months in East Africa – compared to 2016 and 2015

Banking and Finance: Finance, Law, & Insurance

  • Commercial Bank of Africa (Kenya) is acquiring 100% of Crane Bank Rwanda from DFCU of Uganda
  • Direct Pay Online Group acquired 100% of Virtual Card Service in Botswana and Namibia. This will be followed by the acquisition of 100% of VCS business in South Africa (via Balancing Act Africa)
  • Chase Bank suitors announced by the Business Daily – are led by Societe General, and State Bank of Mauritius (who have also just completed the acquisition of Fidelity Bank)
  • Barclays PLC sold 22% of Barclays Africa
  • KCB was linked to another bid for NBK, although the CMA denied any knowledge of such a deal.
  • Kuramo Capital, the largest shareholder of Transcentury is acquiring 25% of Sterling Capital stockbrokers, the second largest bond trader in the country
  • Diamond Trust to acquire Habib Bank Kenya for shares worth Kshs 1.82 billion (~$18 million). EDIT At the end of July, the Competition Authority approved the deal on condition that Diamond Trust retains at least 41 employees of Habib Bank post-transaction and the Central Bank communicated that the deal would be concluded on 1st August when Habib would cease to exist as a licensed bank.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of a minority stake of 10.68% of I&M Holdings by CDC Group PLC together with certain veto rights.
  • I&M Holdings also has announced the successful completion of a merger with Giro Commercial Bank
  • Carlyle to acquire Global Credit Rating Co. (South Africa)
  • Letshego Holdings Limited (Botswana) acquires afb Ghana
  • Atlas Mara to acquire 13.4% equity in United Bank Nigeria, from Clermont Group for $55 million, increasing its stake to 44.5%
  • Sanlam Group has completed the acquisition of a majority stake in PineBridge Investments East Africa Limited. PIEAL is a leading asset management company in East Africa with operations in Kenya and Uganda – and the competition authority approved this at the end of July.
  • EDIT Alexander Forbes Kenya to change name & brand (to Zamara) after a change of shareholding to comply with new pension law that caps foreign ownership to a maximum of 40%.

Beauty & Pharma/Chem

  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the acquisition of Dan Pharmacie by Mimosa Pharmacy.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the acquisition of Sole Control of Syngenta AG (Syngenta) by China National Agrochemical Corporation (CNAC).
  • The Authority excludes the proposed acquisition of 72% of the issued share capital of Chemserve Cleaning Services Limited by Eye Level Exposure Limited from Part IV of the Act .. (their) combined turnover of KSh. 138,076,904 is below the required merger threshold for mandatory notification
  • Abraaj Group gets approval to acquire 75% of Healthlink Management (Nairobi Women’s hospital?)
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has approved the proposed acquisition of 100% of the issued share capital of Monsanto Kenya by Bayer Aktiengesellschar/KWA Investment. Businessman Chris Kirubi revealed that he holds a 45% stake in agrochemical firm Bayer East Africa.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of the shares in the Dow Chemical Company by Dowdupont Inc. and the Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of the shares in E. I. Du Pont De Numerous and Company by Dowdupont Inc.
  • A local drug store is set to be acquired for Sh. 2 billion. Imperial Health Sciences, which based along Mombasa Road will be acquired by South African investment firm Mara Delta Property Holdings. “The facility will be leased back to Imperial Health Sciences on a 10-year triple net basis, denominated in US$ and guaranteed by Imperial Holdings Limited.”
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorised the acquisition by Kibo Plastic Packaging of a minority (14.02%) shareholding with controlling interest in Blowpast Limited.
  • EDIT Japanese Kansai Plascon Africa has acquired local paint maker Sadolin for Kshs 10 billion.

Food & Beverage

  • Africa’s largest Coca-Cola bottler- Coca-Cola Beverages Africa Proprietary Limited (CCBA) has acquired Equator Bottlers, the third largest Coca-Cola bottler in Kenya. Equator Bottlers, was previously a subsidiary of Kretose Investments Limited owned by the Shah family, has been one of several authorized Coca-Cola Bottlers, which supply products in the Western regions of Kenya. It was established in 1966 and is based in Kisumu. EDIT  At the end of July, the Competition Authority authorized the deal on condition that the merged entity retains at least 2,279 employees post-transaction and that Coca Cola file a compliance report in two years.

  • The Abraaj Group is to acquire 100% of Java House Group from Emerging Capital Partners – the story was first broken at Wallace Kantai’s blog and the deal is said to be worth about $130 million. Java House Group was established in Nairobi in 1999. In 2012, Emerging Capital Partners acquired a majority stake in the Company, with the founder retaining a minority stake. ECP has helped Java House grow from 13 shops in Nairobi into East Africa’s largest casual dining brand, building an ‘eat-out’ culture. Today, it has an unrivalled regional footprint of 60 stores across 10 cities in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda.
  • Catalyst Principal Partners has, through a newly established firm, Britania Foods Limited, acquired the business and operations of Jambo Biscuits Ltd, being a leading biscuits manufacturer in Kenya with its flagship “Britania” brand.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the acquisition of assets of Wanainchi Marine Products (Kenya) by One Holdings.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the acquisition of Sosco Fishing Industries by One Holdings.
  • Distell, Africa’s leading producer of spirits, wines, ciders and ready-to-drinks (RTDs) continues to ramp up its investment on the African continent, with the acquisition of a further 26.43% in KWA Holding East Africa Limited (KWAL), Kenya’s foremost spirits manufacturer and distributor, from Centum Investment Company Limited. The African liquor giant now owns a majority shareholding of 52.43% in KWAL, having previously acquired a 26% stake from Industrial and Commercial Development Corporation (ICDC) in 2014.
  • Netherlands-based private equity firm DOB Equity announced that in which in December 2016 that it had acquired a stake in Kenya’s Countryside Dairy, a Nyahururu-based facility with a processing capacity of 100,000 litres of milk per day.
  • Amethis and Metier to acquire East African FMCG firm, Kenafric Industries.. Two private equity funds have bought a 40% minority stake in Kenafric Industries as the firm eyes regional growth…popular products under the confectionery and culinary segments include Fresh brand of chewing gum and Oyo food additive. It also manufactures snacks and ready-to-drink juices at its plant in Nairobi’s Baba Dogo. The business, started 30 years ago by Velji Punja Shah and his four sons, is looking to increase its coverage of other East African countries, saying it currently sells 45% of its products outside Kenya.  
  • EDIT: The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorised the proposed acquisition of indirect control of Weetabix East Africa by Post Holdings through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Westminster Acquisition.
  • EDIT:  Twiga Foods, the Kenyan business-to-business food supply platform announced today that it has successfully raised a Series A funding round including $6.3 million in equity and $4 million in debt instruments.
    • The round was led by Wamda Capital and includes Omidyar Network, DOB Equity, Uqalo, 1776, Blue Haven Initiative, Alpha Mundi, and AHL.
    • Today, Twiga is the largest distributor of several basic food staples in Kenya, having sold over 55 million bananas alone and delivering over 4,000 orders a week.
    • Additional to the Series A round closing, Twiga closed some $2 million in grant funding from USAID, GSMA, and others to support bolt-on farmer services, financial inclusion, and first of their kind domestic food safety initiatives.

Hotels/Tourism

  • Simba Corporation acquired a 35% minority stake in Hemingways Holdings and plans to grow from its current three properties: the Olare Mara and Villa Rosa managed by world leading hoteliers, Kempinski, and Acacia Premier Kisumu, as Hemingways is the parent company of three iconic properties that represent the definitive portfolio of luxury travel in Kenya: Hemingways Watamu, Ol Seki Hemingways Mara and Hemingways Nairobi. The transaction also includes Express Travel Group, a subsidiary of Hemingways that provides comprehensive and high quality travel management services through its international franchise partnerships with American Express Global Business Travel and Europcar International as well as through Hemingways Expeditions, a premium Destination Management Company. EDIT: The competition authority approved the deal at the end of July.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the proposed acquisition of control of Abercrombie & Kent Kenya (Abercrombie) by Yan Zhao Global, from A&K Cayman L.P and other minority shareholders
  • Thomas Cook India acquired Kuoni Travel specialists in 17 countries (includes Private Safaris E.A. in Kenya)
  • Accor Hotels will relaunch Tune hotel under the ibis Styles brand.
  • Older hotels – 680 and Boulevard, two older iconic Nairobi hotels have been recently bought by the Deputy President, William S. Ruto.

Logistics, Engineering, & Agri-Biz

  • Isuzu will become a 57.7% shareholder in Isuzu East Africa through the purchase of General Motors’ shareholding in the business. The other shareholders will remain as Kenya’s Industrial and Commercial Development Corporation (20%), Centum Investments (17.8%) and Itochu Corporation (4.5 %). EDIT: At the end of July, the Competition Authority of Kenya authorised the deal on condition that the merged entity absorbs all 383 GMEA employees, continues after-sales service of all the vehicle brands, Isuzu and Chevrolet sold and leased by GMEA for duration of all the after-sales service contracts, honours all existing dealership agreements between GMEA and its dealers, and communicates to all GMEA customers on the continuation of after-sales service.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the proposed subscription for 24.99% shareholding in Trans-Century with 100% of the redeemable preference shares in TC Mauritius Holdings by Kuramo Africa Opportunity Kenyan Vehicle.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the transfer of 50% of the issued shares in Safal Building Systems to Mabati Rolling Mills.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of 100% of Kenya Kazi by Gardaworld
  • Rift Valley Railways (RVR), the company that runs the century-old Kenya-Uganda railway, has moved to court in a last-minute effort to stop the concession manager, Kenya Railways Corporation (KRC), from terminating its 25-year contract.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of Reunert Limited of 75.39% of the ordinary shares in Metal Fabricators of Zambia PLC.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of 40.7% of the ordinary shares and control of ARM Cement Limited by CDC Africa Cement.
  • Crown Paints to buy back 15% of its stock, the first company to do this.. now allowed by Kenya’s new companies law.
  • EDIT Athi River Mining is selling its Mavuno Fertilizer subsidiary to Omya and Pinner Heights to focus on its cement business.

Oil/Energy

  • German-based solar electrification firm Mobisol has acquired pay-as-you-go off-grid (PAYG) solar industry software firm Lumeter.
  • Hass Petroleum sold a 40% stake to Oman Trading International to fund growth in Eastern Africa
  • Tullow Oil plc sold stakes in Uganda to Total Oil for $900M, and will retain 10% of that and of a $3.5 billion pipeline through Tanzania
  • Vitol Africa gets approval to acquire 19.91% of Vivo Energy from Shell Overseas Investments
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of indirect control in Dalbit Petroleum by Humphrey Kariuki Ndegwa.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of the retail petroleum business of Hashi Energy by Lake Oil
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of the retail petroleum business of Hashi Energy Limited by Lake Oil Limited
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of 100% of Gulf African Petroleum Corporation by Total Outre-Mer S. A. on condition that Total Outre-Mer S. A. comply with the following hospitality and employment conditions— including All agreements remain in force with relation to the Mombasa Terminal; and the merging parties are limited in the termination of employees of Gulf African Petroleum.
  • PIC South Africa will take up all shares not taken up in the Kengen Kshs 4.4 billion on offer. The South African government employees pension giant with $133 billion of assets will take up 351.2 million new shares at Kshs 6.55 each (totaling Kshs 2.30 billion) as other shareholders get diluted by 5.33% each e.g. The Kenya Government which was a 74% shareholder before, will have 70% afterwards.

Real Estate & Supermarkets

  • The Competition Authority of Kenya authorized the proposed joint venture between Helios Investment Partners and certain shareholders of Acorn Group.
  • Cytonn Investments Management (Kenya) to acquire a $10 million stake in Superior Homes.
  • Konza Tech City is seeking investors to apply for land to build campuses, BPO’s, offices, hotels, and student housing etc.
  • China Wu Yi acquires Sh530m Kilifi land.
  • In April last year, Mara bought a 45.5% stake in Naivasha-based Buffalo Mall for Sh. 440 million. Mara has valued its investment in Buffalo Mall at $6 million (Sh. 603 million), implying a capital gain of Sh. 163 million in less than a year. The mall now brings in 2% of the multinational’s total revenues and represents 2% of its assets. The property is however yet to make a profit, with the six months ended December showing a pre-tax loss of Sh.2.8 million.
  • EDIT  Uchumi expects to conclude a deal with an investor that is worth Kshs 3.5 billion of new shares.

Telecommunications, Media & Publishing

  • Vodafone sold a 35% stake in Safaricom to South Africa’s Vodacom (link)
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of certain passive infrastructure of East Africa Towers by Kenya Towers.
  • Catalyst Principal Partners has acquired a significant minority interest in Kensta Group, a 52-year-old East African printing and packaging company Kensta Group manages a diverse set of companies within East Africa namely Transpaper (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda), Express Automation (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda), Vivid Printing Equipment, Fusion Inks, Zenith Rubber Rollers and Phiramid (Zambia).
  • Kenyan IT multinational Craft Silicon has acquired a Sh51.5 million minority stake in restaurants listing portal EatOut, marking its second major backing of a local tech company. Craft Silicon is a founder-shareholder of Little, which is also backed by local telco giant Safaricom. (via Business Daily)
  • Deal undone: Ghafla Kenya CEO Samuel Majani spoke about how a Ghafla merger with Ringier unraveled and on a lot of the intricacies of the issues such as exclusivity, assets & liabilities, dealing with partners & other shareholders, and on merging staff, customers & systems.
  • Deal undone: a Merger with JamboPay was unstuck after a court finding, and the founder of JamboPay, the firm that supplies Nairobi County’s e-payments platform, won a protracted battle against a rival firm over use of its trade name.
  • Mara Social Media acquired global Instant Messaging & communications platform “Nimbuzz” which has over 200 million users and is available for Android, iPhone, and Symbian, MIDP, Windows Phone, BlackBerry and PC & MAC clients
  • Film Studios has been acquired by MoSound
  • MTN is to acquire MultiChoice Africa – owners of @DSTV & GoTV
  • EDIT The Competition Authority authorised the proposed acquisition of fibre optic cable from Bandwith  & Cloud Services Group by Safaricom.
  • EDIT Safaricom’s $1 million Safaricom Spark Venture Fund announced its sixth and final investment in agri-tech startup iProcure – which seeks to increase agricultural output in Kenya, which has remained comparatively low to other countries due to challenges including access to and use of quality inputs. Other invests include FarmDrive, Sendy, and mSurvey.
  • EDIT IFC invests Sh619m ($6 million) in mobile tech firm Africa’s Talking with the funds earmarked for the company’s expansion in Africa beyond the current seven markets where it has a presence.

Other

  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the acquisition of Section Investment by Kisima Management.
  • The Competition Authority of Kenya has authorized the proposed acquisition of 43.8% of Kinetic Holdings by Catalyst Kinetic Investments.

$1 = Kshs 103

Bank Rankings Part 1: Kenya’s Top 10 Banks

2016 was an interesting, but also a challenging year, with a few key events happening that will alter the industry and future bank rankings going forward.

Who are the top banks at the end of 2016? We should start having their audited 2016 results published over the next eight weeks. But who will top the bank rankings for 2016, and why? (last year‘s bank ranking in brackets)

September 2016 numbers used

1 (1) KCB Kenya’s largest bank. growing at 5% year, going to embrace digital in a few weeks. KShs 480 billion in assets, 21.7 billion in pre-tax profit, with Kshs 372 billion of deposits and Kshs 332 billion of loans

2 (2) Equity Bank. Kshs 380 billion of assets and 19.5 billion profit. Deposits grew 15% in the year but they have put most of that in government securities.

3 (3) Cooperative Bank: Kshs 352 billion assets and 15 billion profit. Coop is using digital and agents to contain costs.

4 (5) Standard Chartered: Kshs 264 billion assets and 10.7 billion profit.

5 (4) Barclays: Still keen on growing in Kenya despite parent Barclays having to sell off the Africa unit. Growing at 10% a year, Kshs 264 billion assets and 8.7 billion profit.

6 (8) Diamond Trust: Still growing at 20%, probably benefiting from the fallout at Imperial. Kshs 230 billion assets and 6.2 billion profit.

7 (6) Stanbic: Shed the CFC part of the CFC-Stanbic name 10 years after the merger

8 (7) Commercial Bank of Africa. CBA was the the largest bank by customer numbers, thanks to M-pesa powered M-shwari, but loans are flattening. Kshs 211 billion assets, 5.4 billion profit.

EDIT  9 I&M Bank EDIT 

10 (9) NIC bank. Kshs 156 billion assets, and 4.5 billion profits.

EDIT 10 (13) Citibank: breaks into the top 10. Kshs 116 billion assets, and 4.1 billion profits.

Just out of the top 10, is I&M bank and troubled Chase and National banks. It is important to note that all the top banks, led by KCB, Equity and Coop all embrace a mix of agency and digital/mobile phone banking as a basis for future growth.
$1 = ~Kshs 101

KCB to Unveil a Digital Finance Future in Q2 of 2017

KCB is working on revolutionizing their banking strategy that will culminate in a digital finance rollout in a few weeks. This was revealed by KCB CEO Joshua Oigara at a financial technology forum at the Capital Club in Nairobi that featured futurist & author Brett King. Oigara said that in their 100 years of existence, KCB had gained 5 million customers, but in the two years since launching KCB M-Pesa, that number had doubled.

KCB is working with King and Deloitte, on new digital finance products and strategy, which they had already shown to the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK), who have to approve banking products and changes in the country.  Oigara said that customers are adaptable and don’t mind the changes, but that it is banks that have resisted innovation, and that said he has met many young KCB customers who have never been to branches (mobile is all that matters for them).

Numbers from KCB’s last Investor briefing (Q3 2016) show that 73% of KCB transactions were done outside branches (up from 62% a year earlier). Also, 75% of customers use mobile phone banking services and 91% of loans transactions are processed this way – and they averaged 80,000 loans per day after adjusting bank loan terms in line with the banking amendment law late in 2016.

Digital banking was worth Kshs 641 billion ($6.4 billion) to KCB and of that Kshs 332 billion (52%)  was from mobile. 18% (Kshs 116 billion) was from internet channels, while ATM was responsible for 17%, 9% from agency banking, and 4% (28 billion) from merchant channels.

Rumours are that the bank’s strategy would be akin to Equity Banks’ 3.0 strategy. This would enable KCB to manage customer accounts, cash, loans, insurance, as they send money or buy airtime, and sell them other products at a lower cost than agents and branches, while also integrating better with their customer lifestyles.

Writing in the Business Daily on the financial technology revolution that’s coming to East Africa, Oigara cautioned that, currently, a lot of the innovation in finance is happening outside traditional banking and finance institutions and beyond the sphere of regulators to manage risk in banking.

KCB will be having more fintech forums in the coming months.

Make Innovation the Centre of your Business and Job or Face Disruption

These were the words of Brett King, a futurist and bestselling Author spoke about disruptive innovation to guests at a business forum at the Capital Club, Nairobi. He had been invited by KCB Group, Kenya’s largest bank, which he is advising on a digital finance strategy.

He said that companies that are based on innovation and technology ( E.g Google, Facebook, Alibaba, Baidu, have ten times more profit (~$500,000 per employee) than traditional companies of ($30,000 per employee) or banks ($50,000 per employee)  as they are more efficient at converting production to profits

Other comments:

  • Historically technology that is cool but disruptive ,is resisted and he compared Luddites who smashed factory machinery in England in 1812, to taxi drivers smashing Uber cars in France 200 years later.
  • He expected more contextualization of financial service a based on location and behaviour: e.g. walk into an Apple Shop and you get a finance offer on your phone about a new device you have been longing to buy.
  • Bitcoin’s ability to be a currency is hampered because owners of the coins are hoarding them like gold so they appreciate in price (which is now $1,000). They are not using the bitcoins to make payments which are what currencies are meant to do.
  • There’s a bright future for peer to peer (P-2-P) insurance (more than P-2-P lending).
  • The service jobs there today will be replaced by automation/robotics. But this creates even newer service jobs (every job lost to technology create 2.6 others), and students considering careers should ask themselves how they will compete with Artifical Intelligence (AI) or work in jobs that enable the future e.g. solar adapters.
  • Entrepreneurs should create businesses that take advantage of AI. The mid-2030’s will be an exciting time as there will be more energy from renewable sources than fossil fuels and more robots than humans.
  • On Kenya’s revolutionary M-pesa, which had facilitated the fastest financial inclusion shift in history, he said it was clunky as it was designed for feature phones.

Chase Bank Depositors Update

This morning, the Governor of the Central Bank met with depositors of Chase Bank. He reassured them that, even if the receivership process had been silent, they were his priority and that they were working as fast as they could to reopen the bank and give them full access to their deposits. He said there was a lot of support and goodwill (no one has sued him in this case, as has happened with other banks), and that the numbers at Chase Bank were not mysterious (unlike with other banks). He mentioned that they recovered Kshs 8 billion from directors within two weeks and that they were working to accelerated debt recovery and get non-performing loans performing.

He added that contrary to the perception that the bank should never have been placed under receivership other banks and that this has made investors lose faith in banking in Kenya, he said that other bankers tell him that the sector has gotten stronger, more stable and more credible as they believed it was important to clean up this sector and that laws were followed. He said that other countries were looking at Kenya and emulating actions e.g. Uganda, Tanzania, Mozambique.

Phase three of the receivership now commences, and in the next few weeks, they are inviting final expressions of interest to invest in Chase Bank for them to review. They want serious investors who will have the resources (no Mickey-Mouse, or Johnny-come-Lately ones) to support the bank and take it higher even after the receivership is lifted which should be sometime in Q1 2017. He hoped that matter is wrapped up by the time the first anniversary (Chase Bank was placed in receivership on April 6 2016) comes round, and that Chase Bank becomes a case study for bringing a bank out of receivership and sustaining it.

There were lots of question from shareholders, on asking for timelines for full restoration of the bank, payments of any other tranches (no plans for that), that they should get paid interest for the receivership period (he said he’d rather work towards them getting full access to their principal deposits and have any discussion of interest with the new investors).

He thanked KCB and the hard working staff of CBK, and mentioned that a KPMG audit of Chase was still ongoing. He thanked the customers for their support which he said was indicative of their belief in the bank. 13,000 new accounts have been opened since the receivership was lifted and only a tenth of what they expected was withdrawn when the bank was reopened.