(13th January 2004 – Europe) JPMorgan executives will have no excuse for arriving at work in dirty cars after the bank bought the world’s largest car wash business last week.The bank purchased European car wash company IMO for £350 million (A$831 million) from a group of private equity firms that included Bridgepoint and Phoenix Equity Partners.
IMO was originally founded in Germany in 1965 and has more than 800 sites across 12 European countries, 255 of which are in the UK. The company washes more than 30 million vehicles each year. In 1990 the German operation was sold off to fund the UK business but the two entities were reunited in 1998 after a management buy-in.
JPMorgan’s move on the business is an example of the lively mergers and acquisitions environment in Europe with investors taking advantage of low interest rates.