Westbridge, a German property-sector services provider, is being prepped for sale by owner GENUI, three sources familiar with the situation told Mergermarket.

The Hamburg-based sponsor has appointed Lazard to advise on the process for Westbridge, which specialises in sustainability management for the real estate and housing industries, the sources said.

A sale process is expected to kick off next year, one source said.

Westbridge is forecast to generate around EUR 15m-EUR 17m EBITDA for 2023, two of the sources said. For 2024, EBITDA is expected to exceed EUR 20m, one of the sources said.

Valuation expectations for the asset are high and are reaching 15x-20x EBITDA, one of the sources said. Westbridge has been registering high interest from strategic players in particular ahead of a process launch, this source added.

The business was founded in 2015 in Frankfurt, according to its website. In 2022, the company merged with Argentus, a German specialist in environmental, social and governance (ESG) due diligence, in which GENUI invested in 2021.

At the time of publication, the combined group has a score of 20 out of 100 according to Mergermarket’s Likely to Exit (LTE) predictive algorithm*, heavily weighted by the average rate of sponsor exits in the region in the last six months.

Westbridge also completed at least two other acquisitions last year, including agradblue, a Hamburg-based provider of carbon analytics, energy audits and ESG due diligence for the real estate sector; and a stake in Quantrefy, a Frankfurt-based ESG data management company.

The company’s services help clients measure, optimise and offset CO2 emissions and meet sustainability goals, and include green building measures, energy purchasing, sustainable operations management and smart metering concepts such as water conservation, according to its website.

Westbridge has around 170 employees in Frankfurt, Hamburg and Düsseldorf.

GENUI and Westbridge declined to comment. Lazard did not respond to requests for comment.

*Mergermarket’s LTE predictive analytics assign a score to sponsor-backed companies to help track and predict when an exit could occur through M&A, an IPO, a direct listing or a deSPAC transaction.