Harcos Capital allies with Ottolina and launches an Italian coffee hub

Harcos Capital Partners, through a club deal, invests in the coffee sector and creates a consolidation platform where the first equity partner will be the Caffè Ottolina group, a historic Milanese coffee roasting company founded in 1948. The aggregation project will be promoted by RoastMaster Capital, a platform created to enhance and strengthen the coffee sector in Italy.

The operation involves the entry of Caffè Ottolina and Horeca Servizi (the group's holding company) into a holding company (RoastMaster Capital) in which the Ottolina family will reinvest while maintaining the operational leadership of the company, benefiting from the industrial and financial support of the new group.

Harcos Capital Partners will become a relative majority shareholder with more than 40 per cent of the capital and, in addition to its role as lead investor, will act in concert with management in the strategy of expansion by external lines and, ultimately, exit.

The initiative aims to create one of Italy's leading roasting groups, capable of competing in international markets. The goal is to achieve a group turnover of around 70 million euros in the next four years. 'With RoastMaster Capital we want to breathe new life into a sector that has always represented Italian excellence, but which today needs greater scale, investment capacity, and international openness,' says Emanuele Musini, CEO of RoastMaster Capital and promoter of the initiative.

Caffè Ottolina wanted to join the project, sharing its vision: to unite the excellence of Italian coffee to create a solid, international and sustainable group. The company now enjoys a robust financial position and steady growth (with a turnover of 13m and an Ebitda of 2.6m, both of which are clearly up on 2024), and sees in RoastMaster Capital the opportunity to strengthen its presence in foreign markets and contribute to the development of the group as a reference platform for the sector.