The technical design office for civil engineering is taken over by its CEO, Idriss Benslimane, accompanied by Avenir EntreprisesGroupe Structure et Réhabilitation (GSR) is organising its MBO, led by its current CEO, Idriss Benslimane, who already held 50% of the shares via a personal holding company, thus succeeding Christophe Perrod – who is selling his shares – to the group’s chairman. The engineering firm specialising in engineering structures and underground pipelines, generating €7.3 million in turnover, is welcoming new managers to its capital, as well as a minority financier, Avenir Entreprises, which is investing a confidential amount in shares and OCs via its AED fund. GSR, born in 2007 from the merger of Structure et Réhabilitation, founded by Idriss Benslimane in 1997, and Geoscan, headed by Christophe Perrod, reorganises the debt subscribed at the time with BNP Paribas, Caisse d’Epargne and Crédit du Nord.
R&D at the heart of the strategy
The group, employing 80 engineers and senior technicians, implements innovative tools to detect the pathology of civil engineering structures in concrete – including underground structures or structures and buildings. It also offers technical monitoring of civil engineering works, and its references include customers such as SNCF, EDF, the Ministry of Defence, as well as numerous local authorities. “We were convinced that this was an extremely long-lasting and promising market, because the canalisations of the cities are often old and must therefore be maintained and rehabilitated, explains Jacques Solleau, director of Avenir Entreprises. There is therefore a bright future for the most successful companies in terms of technology and GSR is one of them. “Indeed, the SME had launched an ambitious R&D plan in 2008, developing its own state-of-the-art auscultation techniques. A strategy that the new manager, who has the majority of the capital, intends to pursue and aims at a turnover of 10 M€ in 2013.
