L Squared Capital Partners Leads Investment in GWS Tool Group

L Squared Capital Partners (L Squared) and GWS Tool Group (GWS or the Company) announced that L Squared has partnered with GWS management to recapitalize the Company. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. 

GWS represents L Squared’s tenth platform investment over the last five years. L Squared’s investment provides a long-term capital base to support the Company’s ongoing and rapid evolution.

The continued expansion of GWS through acquisitions and constant investment in world class technology, people and equipment has created a value proposition for customers operating in advanced machining environments, especially in custom tooling. GWS remains committed to the expansion of this value proposition. 

This transaction provides capital to further the GWS acquisition strategy, helping to accelerate the expansion of the Company’s geographic footprint to support even more localized customer need. Moreover, GWS plans to accelerate investment in its people as well as its state-of-the art facilities.  These investments will further reinforce the Company’s product quality, delivery times and overall customer satisfaction. 

L Squared Capital Partners lead the equity investment with participation from the GWS management team, as well as the Company’s incumbent financial sponsor, Addison Capital Partners. Varagon Capital Partners led the debt financing to support the recapitalization.  Vedder Price served as legal counsel to L Squared. Piper Jaffray served as an advisor and Akerman LLP served as legal counsel to GWS.  The L Squared deal team was composed of Randall Hunt, Jeff Farrero and Tyler Huez.