Private equity firm Juuri Partners acquires minority stake in Nitor Group Oy, a Finnish digital engineering company specialized in digitalization and development of business operations. The company has tripled its turnover over the past five years while maintaining excellent profitability. Nitor is Juuri Fund II’s first investment, adding business-critical digital strategy expertise to Juuri’s portfolio of companies.
Juuri Partners invests in Nitor, a digital engineering company providing business-critical digital service development, to support the company’s strong growth going forward. In the past five years the company almost tripled its turnover to approximately EUR 29 million and the growth outlook remains very strong. Nitor is strongly focused on developing its corporate culture and employs nearly 200 top experts in Finland and Sweden, who implement sustainable digital development at the heart of their customers’ strategy. Nitor’s biggest customers include Posti, OP Financial Group, SOK, Elisa and Kesko, among others. As examples of Nitor’s services, the company has designed and implemented the information system reform of Posti’s network with more than 2,000 parcel machines, and renewed Kesko’s customer feedback system playing a key role in development of customer experience.
Nitor’s investments in corporate culture are reflected as high employee and customer satisfaction. The company ranked first in the Finnish Great Place to Work list in 2018 (second place in the European ranking) and 2019 (third place in the European ranking).
– The combination of strong growth and excellent profitability is always extremely attractive to investors. Nitor is at the center of the digital revolution by streamlining and modernizing its customers’ core processes. The company’s expertise is top-class, and we believe that there is increasing demand for it also outside Finland. As an investor, we bring support and know-how to international growth, increasing brand awareness and developing the board work, says Hanna Viinikainen, a partner at Juuri Partners.
– Customer and employee satisfaction are the cornerstones of Nitor’s operations and we will continue to build Nitor’s growth on these in the future. Now is the time to deepen our offering even further. We aim to strengthen our foothold in our current markets in Finland and Sweden, and we are also exploring opportunities for international expansion, adds Olli Auvinen, CEO of Nitor Group.
Nitor’s core services consist of digital business strategy work and service design as well as development of digital solutions for its customers. The company also provides agile business model training and organizational coaching European-wide. Data science and application maintenance services are latest additions to Nitor’s offering.
Juuri makes the investment together with Ilmarinen Mutual Pension Insurance Company by jointly purchasing a minority stake of approximately 30 percent from the founders of Nitor. All founders will remain as significant shareholders in Nitor. At the same time, the company’s ownership base will be expanded by offering all employees an opportunity to become owners of the company.
In connection with the investment, Max Alfthan, who is currently KONE Corporation’s Senior Advisor, will be elected as a new member of Nitor’s Board of Directors. Max brings to the board world-class expertise in, among other things, marketing, communications and strategy work.
Additional information:
Hanna Viinikainen, Partner, Juuri Partners Oy, tel. +358 50 407 1788, hanna.viinikainen@juuripartners.fi
Olli Auvinen, President and CEO, Nitor Oy, tel. +358 40 509 6248, olli.auvinen@nitor.com
Juuri Partners Oy
Juuri Partners’ 10-person team manages a total of over EUR 200 million through Juuri Fund I Ky and Juuri Fund II Ky private equity investment funds. These funds offer equity and debt financing for established and profitable small and medium-sized enterprises in Finland. Juuri Partners offers growth-oriented companies a novel concept of financing and business development that combines active ownership, business support and debt financing. The funds’ investor base consists of both Finnish and international institutional investors. www.juuripartners.com
Nitor Group Oy
Nitor’s Digital Engineers are committed to sustainable digital development. The Digital Engineering company creates adaptive business-critical systems and services with a lifetime guarantee. Nitor currently employs nearly 200 Digital Engineers with a shared passion to harness digitalization for creativity, productivity and new business. Agility is at our core: we help drive agile methods across the organization. Over the years, the Helsinki and Stockholm-based Nitor has been awarded as the Red Herring Global Top 100 winner, Tivi ICT Company of the Year in Finland, and one of the best places to work in Europe as listed by the Great Place to Work® institute. www.nitor.com/en