Case Study: ICA Group

The attraction of the initial acquisition of Hickton Consultants was its differentiated offering / market leadership within a niche segment of the Building Services market. Macaulay negotiated the terms of the transaction, including facilitating an investment by the incumbent Managing Director, who had been appointed by the founder vendor two years previously to take on the leadership of the business.
The Macaulay team took on an active role at Board level throughout, engaging regularly with management to support operational, financial and strategic decision-making. Initially, this involved identifying and recruiting a Finance Director to strengthen the company’s financial infrastructure. The appointment was instrumental in professionalising internal reporting and financial modelling, while enhancing the quality and timeliness of management information provided to the Board.
Working closely with management, Macaulay identified an opportunity to accelerate growth through the expansion of the Group’s service offering beyond its core Clerk of Works activities. Building Control services were identified as a strategically attractive adjacent market, leading to the acquisition of BRCS in 2017.
Following the BRCS acquisition, a new Finance Director was appointed to enhance the Group’s reporting capabilities and strengthen its operational infrastructure in line with the increasing scale and complexity of the business.
Macaulay then led the sourcing and execution of the strategically important acquisition of Cook Brown.As part of the Cook Brown transaction, the incumbent joint MDs joined the Board and, assumed responsibility as Managing Directors of the enlarged Group, alongside the existing Finance Director – roles they continued to hold through to exit. This transition also saw the original MD move to a Non-Executive role, before retiring fully a year later.
Subsequent bolt-on acquisitions served to broaden the service offering further (Millington Lord) and provide greater geographic coverage in the increasingly important Building Control activity (Align). The change of name to ICA (‘Inspection, Certification & Audit’) reflected the breadth of the Group offering and the ambition of the team to develop the business further.
During the investment lifecycle, the Group also completed a refinancing under Macaulay’s ownership, alongside a subsequent capital raise involving both debt and equity funding to support continued growth initiatives.
The investment period was not without challenges. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Group experienced periods of constrained cash flow and difficult trading conditions. Macaulay worked closely with management and the Group’s lenders to maintain constructive stakeholder relationships and successfully navigate the business through these pressures.