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KKR Enters Exclusive Negotiations with GBL for Webhelp Group

July 10, 2019

LONDON & PARIS–(BUSINESS WIRE)– KKR, a leading global investment firm, announces today it has entered into exclusive negotiations to sell a majority stake in the Webhelp group to Groupe Bruxelles Lambert (“GBL”). GBL will invest alongside Webhelp’s co-founding shareholders, Olivier Duha and Frédéric Jousset, who would retain their role as founding executive directors, and Webhelp’s management team.

Founded in 2000, Webhelp is today one of the world’s leading providers of customer experience and business process outsourcing (BPO). The company develops innovative solutions combining consulting services, technological solutions and omni-channel processing capabilities with 50,000 employees in more than 35 countries. Since KKR’s acquisition in 2015, Webhelp has doubled in size as the result of an organic and external growth strategy that GBL aims to maintain and accelerate, together with the strong collaboration of the co-founders and management.

As a result of this transaction, GBL would acquire a majority stake in Webhelp on the basis of an enterprise value of €2.4 billion. It is expected that the legal documentation will be signed by the beginning of August for completion, after obtaining regulatory authorizations, within the course of Q4 2019.

Johannes Huth, Member and Head of KKR EMEA, and Stanislas de Joussineau, Director at KKR, said: “Our successful collaboration with Olivier and Frederic has turned Webhelp into a true European champion. The support we have provided to Webhelp builds on our track record in helping founder-led businesses realise their growth ambitions, and helping French companies expand internationally. We believe the company is strongly positioned for future growth and we wish Webhelp and GBL every continued success.”

Olivier Duha and Frédéric Jousset, co-founders of Webhelp, said: “We thank KKR for its investment over the past four years and we welcome with confidence GBL in order to write together a new growth and investment phase. The management team has chosen to surround itself with a shareholder renowned for its longstanding support to companies with international ambitions such as Webhelp.”

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About KKR
KKR is a leading global investment firm that manages multiple alternative asset classes, including private equity, energy, infrastructure, real estate and credit, with strategic partners that manage hedge funds. KKR aims to generate attractive investment returns for its fund investors by following a patient and disciplined investment approach, employing world-class people, and driving growth and value creation with KKR portfolio companies. KKR invests its own capital alongside the capital it manages for fund investors and provides financing solutions and investment opportunities through its capital markets business. References to KKR’s investments may include the activities of its sponsored funds. For additional information about KKR & Co. Inc. (NYSE:KKR), please visit KKR’s website at www.kkr.com and on Twitter @KKR_Co.

About Webhelp
Webhelp is a global business process outsourcer (BPO), specialising in customer experience and payment services in addition to sales and marketing services across voice, social and digital channels.

From more than 150 sites in 36 countries with an approximately 50,000-strong team, our focus is on engineering performance improvements and delivering a real and lasting transformation in our clients’ operating models to generate financial advantage. We partner with some of the world’s most progressive brands including Sky, Shop Direct, Bouygues, Direct Energie, KPN, Vodafone, La Redoute, Michael Kors and Valentino.

Headquartered in Paris, France, the company has grown its revenues by more than 250% in the last 4 years by investing in its people, the environment they work in and developing its analytical and operating capability to deliver a transformational outsourcing proposition that addresses the challenges of an omni-channel world. More information can be found at www.webhelp.com

Forward-Looking Statements
This press release may contain forward-looking statements, identified by words such as “expect,” “aim,” “estimate,” “will,” “may” and “believe” or similar expressions. These forward-looking statements are subject to the inherent uncertainties in predicting future results and conditions. Certain factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those included in these forward-looking statements, and investors should not place undue reliance on such statements. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this press release, and KKR does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any of the forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances, except as required by law.

Media Contacts:
International
Alastair Elwen
Finsbury
Phone: +44 (0) 20 7251 3801
Email: alastair.elwen@finsbury.com

France
Olivier Blain
Adding Value Conseils
ob@addingvalueconseils.com
+33 6 72 28 29 20

Source: KKR


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