A newly established private equity fund has bought Manitowoc Boom Trucks from The Manitowoc Company. The sale price has not been disclosed.

The purchaser is Quantum Heavy Equipment, a subsidiary of Quantum Value Partners, led by Ken Ghazey.

In a treat for conspiracy theorists, among the partners is David Langevin, who was financial director of Terex until 1998 and was more recently a managing director in the corporate finance department of GKM Value Partners. GKM was the company behind Atlas Construction, the vehicle that was used to acquire German loader crane and excavator manufacturer Atlas Weyhausen in July 2001. GKM brought in Terex to advise on the restructuring of Atlas Weyhausen. By the end of 2001 Terex had taken ownership of Atlas.

Manitowoc was required by the Department of Justice last year, as a condition of approval for its acquisition of Grove Worldwide, to sell either its own boom truck division or Grove’s National Crane subsidiary. For this reason, it seems unlikely that Terex will emerge as the owner of Manitowoc Boom Trucks – unlike the Atlas Weyhausen situation – unless the market situation changes markedly. Lobbying by Terex is believed to have been influenced Department of Justice ruling that bringing National and Manitowoc Boom Trucks together was anti-competitive. A Terex-Manitowoc Boom Trucks tie-up is hardly likely to be considered any more favourably.

As part of the transaction, all of Manitowoc Boom Trucks’ assets and liabilities were transferred to Quantum Heavy Equipment, which, as required under the consent decree with the Department of Justice, has the right to use the “Manitowoc Boom Trucks” brand name for up to three years after the closing.

Excluded from the sale is the model S282, launched at Conexpo 2002, which features a small Potain self-erecting tower crane mounted on a commercial truck. This model was originally part of the the boom truck product line up, but was moved from Manitowoc Boom Truck’s operation in Georgetown, Texas to the Grove plant at Shady Grove, Pennsylvania ahead of the sale.

“While we are disappointed to sell this business, with the completion of this transaction all matters relating to the Grove acquisition are now complete,” said Terry Growcock, Manitowoc’s chairman and chief executive officer.

Ken Ghazey said that Quantum Heavy Equipment planned to buy “adjacent businesses” to develop the equity fund. No specific time period has been set on the duration of Quantum’s ownership of Manitowoc Boom Trucks.