The UK Corporate Finance team is pleased to announce it has advised LDC on its exit of Aquavista, the UK’s largest marina infrastructure provider, to Antin Infrastructure Partners.
Founded in 2003 and based in Nottingham, Aquavista is the UK’s leading marina owner and operator, with 32 inland and coastal marinas offering over 5,300 berths and marine services across the country.
The transaction marks a successful exit for leading private equity investor LDC following a seven-year partnership during which the company nearly tripled revenue and doubled the size of its marina portfolio through a series of strategic acquisitions. This includes the transformational acquisition of Castle Marinas in 2021.
Building on this fast growth, Aquavista is ideally positioned to be the consolidator of the fragmented UK market, capitalising on a strong track record of organic growth complemented by successful acquisitions. The company also benefits from favourable underlying trends: UK boat ownership has been growing steadily, leading to rising storage needs, and growing demand for residential berths has supported high occupancy rates, low churn and resilient revenues.
Antin’s Mid Cap Fund I will be investing in Aquavista alongside CEO Steve de Polo and other members of the management team.
Upon closing, this investment will be the sixth by Antin’s €2.2 billion Mid Cap Fund I. Antin’s Mid Cap strategy focuses on smaller and medium-sized investments in established infrastructure companies in Europe and North America across the energy and environment, digital, transport and social sectors.
“Our seven-year partnership has established Aquavista as a market leader through organic and acquisitive growth, including the strategic acquisition of Castle Marinas, which we supported with significant follow-on funding. It has been a privilege to support this locally headquartered business to become a national success story, and we wish the very best to Steve and his team on the next stage of their journey.”
"We’re delighted with the expertise and dedication provided by PwC throughout this process – they gave us the deep cross-sector knowledge and M&A know-how required to deliver this exceptional result. They really understood our business and ambitions - and what we needed in our next partner. Looking ahead, we’re excited to partner with Antin and build on the strong foundations developed with LDC’s support to accelerate our growth."
"Steve and his team, together with LDC, have built a fantastic business. For PwC Corporate Finance to have been part of their story is a real privilege. In Antin, we have found them a great partner to work with going forwards and we wish them every future success."
PwC Corporate Finance acted as lead financial adviser to the shareholders - the PwC team advising on the deal was Rick Jones, James Pincus, Simon Hampton, Nigel Espie, Colin Davis, Lucie Coussmaker, India Raynes, Mark Douglas, Isaiah Lew.
PwC UK also provided Financial and Tax due diligence services, Debt and Capital advisory services, and Data Insights and Analytics services.
The transaction is expected to close in October 2025.
About Antin Infrastructure Partners
Antin Infrastructure Partners is a leading private equity firm focused on infrastructure. With over €33 billion in assets under management across its Flagship, Mid Cap and NextGen investment strategies, Antin targets investments in the energy and environment, digital, transport and social infrastructure sectors. With offices in Paris, London, New York, Seoul, Singapore and Luxembourg, Antin employs over 240 professionals dedicated to growing, improving and transforming infrastructure businesses while delivering long-term value to portfolio companies and investors. Majority owned by its partners, Antin is listed on Euronext Paris (Ticker: ANTIN – ISIN: FR0014005AL0).
About Aquavista
Aquavista is the UK’s largest marina operator with 32 marinas in unique locations across England. They offer residential and leisure berths, boat sales, floating homes and marine services. Aquavista believes that life is better by the water and are here to help their customers live that life. It is the company’s purpose to make things easy for their customers, so they can truly appreciate life by the water. For more information visit https://www.aquavista.com
About LDC:
- LDC is a private equity investor and part of Lloyds Banking Group. It is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.
- We have invested £3.9bn to back 179 management teams over the last decade. Today, we have a portfolio of more than 90 businesses across the UK.
- We have made investments across all major sectors of the UK economy and are actively supporting businesses in industries including Business Services, Consumer, Healthcare, ICT, Industrials, Media and Technology.
- LDC-backed businesses have grown 3.3x more than the average medium-sized business over the last decade.
- Our teams are based in every part of the UK.
For more information visit www.ldc.co.uk/pressrelease
Contact us
UK Hospitality, Sports & Leisure leader, PwC United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0)7710 627834
