Waterjet acquires Flow International

AMERICAN Industrial Partners (AIP) affiliate, Waterjet Holdings, Inc., acquired Flow International Corporation (Flow), following a Flow shareholders’ meeting on December 20 of last year. 

The investment in Flow was made out of American Industrial Partners Capital Fund V, LP a $717.5-million fund that closed in December 2011.  Under the terms of the merger, Waterjet Holdings acquired all of the outstanding shares of Flow common stock for $4.05 per share in cash.  Terms of the acquisition were first announced on September 25, 2013. Shares of Flow stock cease trading by the close of business on January 31.

Headquartered in Kent, Washington, Flow is the world's leading developer and manufacturer of industrial water jet systems for cutting and cleaning applications like their ultrahigh-pressure water pumps used to cut materials, remove coatings, and prepare surfaces for coating.  Flow has also pioneered many of the new product initiatives in the water jet cutting industry including the introduction of abrasive water jet cutting and cutting composite material with water jet systems. Flow employs approximately 700 people and has manufacturing locations in Kent, Washington and Jeffersonville, Indiana with additional sales offices in Europe, Asia and South America.

"AIP is very excited to partner with Flow's management team and help continue to grow the Company.  Flow's market leading products, sizeable aftermarket sales, global presence, and favorable end market dynamics result in a unique opportunity to continue to grow the use of water jet cutting to the benefit of an expanding universe of Flow customers," said Eric Baroyan of AIP.

David Savage, CEO of Waterjet Holdings, said, "We look forward to continuing to advance the technology of water jet cutting and expanding into high volume manufacturing applications for this exciting and rapidly evolving cutting method and are extremely pleased to be partnering with the American Industrial Partners team.” 

“We intend to further invest in our business and build on our long-standing customer relationships and market leading products to further grow the share of water jet cutting within the broader machine tool cutting industry." Mr Savage added.