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Agic Capital, the Chinese private equity fund launched last year, has bought a European industrial robotics business — in the latest example of the country’s push to gain access to western automation technology.
去年成立的中国私募股权基金汉德资本(Agic Capital)收购了一家欧洲工业机器人公司——这是中国努力获取西方自动化技术的最新一例。
On Sunday, Agic said it had agreed to acquire Gimatic, an Italian supplier of robotic end-of-arm tools valued at between 100m and 150m. It did not disclose a specific price.
周日，汉德表示已经同意收购意大利机械臂前端装置供应商Gimatic，对该企业的估值介于1亿到1.5亿欧元之间。汉德并未公开具体收购价。
Agic was founded by former Deutsche Bank executive Henry Cai, a veteran dealmaker who started Agic with the goal of “shaping smart industries”, focusing on the so-called fourth industrial revolution, in automation and connectivity.
汉德创始人是德意志银行(Deutsche Bank)前高管蔡洪平(Henry Cai)。这名资深交易撮合者创立汉德的目标是“智造未来”，专注于由自动化和连接性扮演主角的所谓第四次工业革命。
Its Gimatic deal is its first as a sole acquirer, but it was a member of the consortium — led by China National Chemical Corp — that purchased KraussMaffei Group for 925m in January. KraussMaffei, a specialist producer of plastics and rubber, is one of Germany’s largest machinery suppliers. Its sale was, at the time, the biggest-ever Chinese acquisition of a German company.
收购Gimatic是汉德首次作为唯一收购者进行交易，但汉德曾是由中国化工集团公司(CNCC)牵头的一个财团的成员，该财团在今年1月斥资9.25亿欧元收购了克劳斯玛菲集团(KraussMaffei)。克劳斯玛菲是一家塑料和橡胶领域的专业设备生产商，是德国最大的机械供应商之一。当时这是中国对德国公司历来最大的收购交易。
While the acquisition of Gimatic is relatively small, it plays into a growing theme of Chinese investment in automation, following last month’s offer from Midea, the Chinese home appliance maker, to purchase German robotics company Kuka.
尽管汉德对Gimatic的收购交易规模相对较小，但这笔交易切中了中国大力投资于自动化这个日益上升的主题。在此之前，上月中国家电制造商美的(Midea)向德国机器人公司库卡(Kuka)发出收购要约。
That deal valued the business at 4.6bn but led some government officials to worry about protecting German technology. Economics minister Sigmar Gabriel has been trying to put together a German or European consortium to offer a counterbid.
那笔交易对库卡的估值达到46亿欧元，但也导致一些政府官员为保护德国技术操心。德国经济部长西格马尔•加布里尔(Sigmar Gabriel)一直试图组织一个德国或者欧洲的财团发出竞争性收购要约。
Gimatic, founded 31 years ago, has been growing its sales by more than 20 per cent a year for the past three years, with four-fifths of its business stemming from Europe. Asia accounted for less than a tenth of sales but is seen as the market with the greatest potential.
31年前成立的Gimatic过去3年的销售额每年增长逾20%，其五分之四业务来自欧洲。亚洲在其销售额中的比例不到十分之一，但亚洲被视为潜力最大的市场。
Agic’s strategy is “top-line growth through internationalisation,” said Heiko von Dewitz, Agic’s Munich-based managing partner. “In the past [Gimatic] has been more margin than growth focused — we’re going to change that a bit.”
汉德的策略是“通过国际化实现收入增长，”汉德驻慕尼黑的管理合伙人海科•冯德维茨(Heiko von Dewitz)表示，“过去(Gimatic)一直更专注于利润率，而非增长——我们将要对此稍加改变。”
Its deal for Gimatic aligns with the industrial strategy spearheaded by Beijing last year to upgrade infrastructure, make China less dependent on manual labour and become a tier-one player in manufacturing.
汉德收购Gimatic的交易符合北京方面去年提出的工业战略，即升级基础设施、减少中国对体力劳动的依赖、成为一流制造业国家。
“Fifty per cent of the global growth in industrial automation and robotics is in China,” said Mr von Dewitz. “Depending on the sources you look at, the global automation market is growing at 10 to 15 per cent. China is growing at 20 per cent. That gives you an idea of how much momentum there is.”
“工业自动化和机器人领域的全球增长有50%在中国，”冯德维茨说，“根据你所看到的不同数据来源，全球自动化市场正以10%到15%的增长率增长，而中国的增速达到20%。这让你对中国的增长势头有多大有一个大致概念。”
He said there is a huge opportunity for European technology companies to expand into China. But while the big companies have figured it out, companies with between $30m and $150m in revenue are further behind. “They know China is a strategic must, but they don’t know how to tackle it,” he said.
他表示，对欧洲科技公司来说，扩张进入中国蕴含了巨大的商机。但尽管大企业都明白这一点，收入在3000万美元到1.5亿美元之间的公司还落在后面。“它们知道进军中国在战略上是势在必行的，但它们不知道应该如何着手，”他说。
