Rubicon Partners takes majority stake in Avove

Rubicon Partners acquired the utilities division of Amey in April 2022, at an enterprise value of approximately £10–30M representing an EV/EBITDA multiple of 5x–12x on the 2022 reporting period. The business was established as a standalone company under the name Avove. Based at Chorley in Lancashire, Avove designs, builds, commissions and maintains the infrastructure through which water and electricity reach their users: treatment works, water and wastewater networks, power distribution assets and the vegetation management accompanying them. It acts as principal contractor, taking responsibility from design through to handover for the regulated utilities operating those networks across Britain and Northern Ireland. Carving a division out of a contracting group requires more than a change of ownership. The systems, the insurance, the bonding capacity and the qualifications held with each utility client sit with the parent, and the separated business must establish all of them before it can bid for work in its own name, which is what these transactions involve and why they attract investors equipped for the operational work. The division traced back to ARM Services, founded in 1964 to serve telecommunications before moving into water during the first regulatory investment period. It became part of Enterprise plc, which grew to a billion pounds of revenue through acquisitions in gas, electricity and public sector services, and passed to Amey when Ferrovial acquired that company in 2013. The utilities division recorded 194 million pounds of revenue under that ownership. Amey was itself under pressure at the time, Ferrovial having sought to dispose of it after losses on a Birmingham highways contract, and the sale of the utilities activity formed part of that reorganisation. Under Rubicon Partners the company doubled in size, acquired the Irish operations of Jacopa in 2025 and passed to H.I.G. Capital in July 2026.