Mergers & Acquisitions in the Logistics Space

2022 - 2023 seems as if it has truly been the year of mergers & acquisitions in the #logistics space. One announcement after another, so I thought this would be beneficial for my followers to take a deeper dive.

I made a LinkedIn video a few months back as I feel this really paints a picture for what's going on in the #economy & #industry , especially in such unprecedented times that have left a number of #Users scratching their heads thinking... "now what?". From endless bottlenecks in the overall #supplychain to rising interest rates - it's unlike anything anyone has ever had to deal with. We can only learn and persevere from the past two years!

To start -

Focusing on #SouthCarolina , Harbor Logistics, subsidiary of NOVA Infrastructure , acquired ATS Logistics Inc & Premier Logistics Solutions (https://www.ttnews.com/articles/nova-subsidiary-harbor-logistics-acquires-ats-logistics) in the last few months. After diving deeper and reading more about these type of deals, it got me thinking... This is a #trend as companies continue to grow and keep up with the #Ports investment into #capacity . With lack of availability to #capital for some of these smaller to mid-size companies, a deal like so makes all the sense in the world.

On a national level, Knight-Swift Transportation recently acquired U.S. Xpress, Inc. (https://investor.knight-swift.com/news/news-details/2023/Knight-Swift-Transportation-Agrees-to-Acquire-U.S.-Xpress-Enterprises-for-6.15-Per-Share/default.aspx) which seems to be the talk of the town recently considering the $808 million price on the acquisition.

The list goes on, but let's dive into the what this means despite #economic uncertainty.

First of all, it demonstrates strong activity amongst #buyers and #sellers - INDIVIDUALS ARE STILL TRANSACTING! When assessing 2007-2009 - companies who made significant acquisitions outperformed those who did not, so think smarter when evaluating potential #growth opportunities.

In my opinion, the M&A activity is strong as the model continues to outperform other investments. This shows that there is #capital out there and people in the #logistics space are looking to expand their footprint and grow the amount of #capacity they can handle to support #operations .

Similar to the value of industrial real estate - there is a low appetite for risk existing in the space in terms of seller expectations, as well as time needed to get a deal done. I think this will correct over time, but there is a gap that needs to be bridged working on creative #deal structure. That's where we come in... Aside from discussing potential real estate and/or assets acquired - we are flexible in terms of capital.

I want all readers to consider my firm, InLight Real Estate Partners , considering our ability to provide #capital in the form of Sale Leaseback financing. To clarify - this essentially means the buyer will assume Debt of the acquired Company or get new #financing to close the Acquisition. Pretty cool how flexible we can get at IREP, right?

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