Identify
Back in 2005 Apax Partners' Media team identified Trader
Media Group as a business of considerable interest.
The company has two principal assets: the Auto Trader series of
publications and, importantly, the autotrader.co.uk website.
It was clear to the Apax team that the company was well positioned
to benefit from the industry shift from print to online.
New leadership
Crucial to the success of this would be recruiting as CEO someone
with experience of refocusing a company for the digital age.
Anticipating that at some point Trader Media Group might be for
sale, the Apax team used its extensive network to identify John
King as potential CEO of the business. John was at the time CEO of
an Australian specialist classified publisher, which he had
successfully led through the transition from print to online.
At the same time, the Apax team began a programme of
comprehensive outside-in due diligence on Trader in order to
understand the business's prospects better, and also began a series
of conversations with GMG to understand their aspirations for the
business.
When GMG decided in 2007 to sell half of Trader, 28 private
equity firms were interested in buying the stake on offer.
Partnering with Apax
Carolyn McCall, former CEO, Guardian Media Group said, "We chose
Apax because we felt we could work very well with them: because
they have sector experience; because they are growth investors; and
because we know some of the people already. We felt there was a
definite alignment, even then, in how we approached the
business"
Support
Post-acquisition, Tom Hall and Irina Hemmers, Partners
in Apax Partners' Media team, joined the Chief Executives and
Finance Directors of both Guardian Media Group and Trader Media
Group on the Board of Trader.
After divesting non-core businesses and reorganising the sales
force to strengthen both publishing and digital sales, a key
element in the company's transition was a material re-launch of the
Auto Trader website. Supported by Seth Brody from Apax's Portfolio
Support Group, Trader invested over £6m in the project to give the
company a springboard for future online growth.
The aim was to make the new site as welcoming and easy to use as
possible, and expand the range of products and services on offer.
Widely known as the No.1 place to search for used cars and
to sell a
car it has made a strategic expansion to offer
new
cars and new
motorbikes. The newly-designed site is cleaner,
with larger images, more detailed car specifications and better
search functionality. For advertisers, the ability to stand out on
the site is an advantage which has led to an increase in revenue
for Trader from contextual advertising.
The other factor that has accelerated Trader's growth is the
introduction of the Razsor brand - a specialist automotive marketing
agency - for dealers: the company now provides dealer websites and
B2B services to help dealers move stock around the country
Of course a digital business needs to keep pace with the latest
technological developments. With the extraordinarily rapid rise in
the use of smartphones in the UK, the next step for Trader is
distributing mobile content as widely as it can through its own
Auto Trader
mobile site and also through a new iPhone
application.
John King, CEO of Trader Media Group commented: "The value that
Apax has brought to this transition has really been about
understanding that a business like ours had to go through a
complete transformation. It's not the sort of journey you'd like to
go on as a publicly listed company. You could only really do what
we've been able to achieve over the last three years in the hands
of private shareholders who understand and believe in the vision
and future that the organisation has. They have been instrumental
in sticking with us through good times and more difficult times,
and have never lost belief in what we all agree this business can
achieve."