Expana (formerly Mintec) is the leading provider of food-related commodity pricing and analytics, serving the global supply chain through its SaaS platform.

Expana had a strong customer base in the UK when we invested but with a limited presence in Europe and in the US and with investment required across the business to help them scale we had to really lean in to deliver growth. Our expertise in data and tech – coupled with our experience growing B2B data and software businesses – meant we were well-placed to help Expana scale up. It was clear that we shared management’s vision for the Company, and we're in agreement about how to reach those goals. Shortly thereafter, we got to work.

Modernisation started with a move from enterprise software to the cloud. We built advanced analytics into the platform, providing key insights for the newly-headed marketing team. Crucially, we entered new markets in order to expand the dataset and provide additional value to customers.

Prior to our investment, there was no dedicated sales and marketing function at Expana. So we helped the team to build sales teams in Europe and the US, with dedicated marketing functions to drive new leads. Together with a structured approach to account management we managed to quadruple ARR during the first phase of our ownership.

Further increasing the already high ROI and value proposition of Expana to its customers was a key lever to driving value and growth. We supported them to invest in a proprietary data team, achieving IOSCO-accreditation and making them the first food-focused PRA in the world. We also identified, negotiated and executed the acquisition of Danish commodities forecasting specialist, Kairos, fully rounding out the price insight capabilities of the Expana platorm.

Having first invested in 2017, we sold a majority stake in the Group in 2022 to Five Arrows Principal Investments, generating a return of 12x cost. This is not the end of the journey though as we chose to re-invest for a significant minority stake, we rebranded the company and are excited about continuing on the journey with Expana.