, Columnist
A $20 Billion Covid-Era Buyout Wasn’t Such a Bad Idea
It looks like Advent and Cinven won't be stuck in this elevator deal.
It looked like an enormous misjudgment – a colossal leveraged buyout of an elevator company in February 2020, just as the idea of cramped spaces was filling us all with dread.
But the private equity consortium led by Advent International and Cinven could yet be vindicated. They paid €17 billion ($20 billion) to win the auction for Thyssenkrupp AG’s elevator business days before the pandemic was declared. Today, offices are jammed and stock markets are setting records. A recent stake sale pinned a valuation of at least €23 billion on the business, Bloomberg News reported.