Royalton buys Poland's largest car park operator

Royalton Partners, a CEE-focused private equity company, has boosted its car park portfolio with the acquisition of a 93% stake in Poland's largest car park operator, Cool Ar.

The acquisition is earmarked for the Royalton Capital Investors II private equity fund, which was established in 2007, UK private equity magazine AltAssets has reported. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Cool Ar was founded in 1994 as a paid parking zone operator, active in 25 Polish towns and cities, servicing a total of 20,000 parking spaces and employing more than 80 people.

In January this year Royalton Partners also acquired a 67.5% stake in the Czech parking group Activ through a direct purchase of shares and a capital increase. Activ Parking is one of the leading parking operators in CEE with operations in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The company has 22,000 parking spaces and employs more than 75 people. Royalton said it planned to provide 'additional development capital, which would enable Activ Parking to further expand its business in its core markets and in the other countries of Central and Eastern Europe'.

The latest addition increases the amount of parking spaces under the management of Royalton's parking group Activ to over 40,000 spaces.