Case study · Inter-Power
One company.
Five acquisitions.
Two exits.
The company
Inter-Power A K Corporation
Sector
Industrial compressors & services
Headquarters
Quebec, Canada
Strategy
Buy-and-build roll-up
Outcome
Two successive exits
Sold to Flow Control Group, an AEA Investors company, then re-invested and exited a second time to Bertram Capital.
How Alfar took a 30-year-old Quebec compressor distributor from lifestyle business to consolidation platform, and returned capital to its partners twice.
01 · The situation
Excellent fundamentals. Untapped potential.
Inter-Power had spent three decades distributing, installing and servicing premium air compressors and vacuum systems across Quebec. The fundamentals were excellent. The ambition wasn’t.
A profitable compressor distribution and maintenance company in a deeply fragmented industry, operated as a lifestyle business.
Owners wearing every hat at once, pulled away from what they did best. Growth and margin suffered for it.
Scale capped by geography: a limited regional reach in a market ready to be consolidated.
02 · The work
The playbook, applied.
We didn’t change what Inter-Power did. We changed how seriously it was run: freeing the owners to focus on clients while we built the machine around them.
Refocus on clients
Freed the owners from operations so they could spend their time where it mattered most: with their best customers.
Redeploy the team
Optimized human capital around top clients and the highest-value service work.
Fix the economics
Rebuilt the pricing strategy and grew billable hours across the service business.
Professionalize finance
Upgraded accounting and instituted monthly KPIs: real visibility, every month.
Invest in people
Strengthened the HR function and measurably increased employee engagement.
Modernize the stack
Overhauled the IT infrastructure to support a much larger business.
03 · The outcome
From regional distributor to consolidation platform.
Alfar invests alongside the founders
A 30-year Quebec institution in compressor distribution and service, with owners who stayed on as true partners.
Five companies acquired and integrated
A highly accretive buy-and-build strategy, with each acquired owner retained as a partner in the platform.
The Northeastern market, consolidated
Inter-Power became the reference platform for industrial compressor distribution in Northeastern North America.
Exit I
Flow Control Group
A holding company of AEA Investors
The platform we built together, validated by one of North America’s leading flow-control consolidators.
Exit II
Bertram Capital
Second successive exit
Alfar re-invested in the combined business and realized a second successful exit.
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