Sonepar Continues International Growth with Agreement to Buy Cheyns in Belgium

Paris-based international electrical distribution giant Sonepar announced that it will acquire Belgian distributor Cheyns NV if the deal is approved by competition authorities in Belgium. Cheyns has 180 people operating 10 locations across Flanders and Wallonia, with its headquarters in Courtrai, a city in western Belgium. Since its founding in 1945 by the Cheyns family the firm has grown to €70 million (approximately $79.5 million) in annual revenues, serving the installer and industrial markets.

Sonepar gets a lot of attention in these pages for its rapid growth in the North American market as a continuing string of acquisitions of high-profile independent electrical distributors vaulted the company to the top of the list of the industry’s largest full-line distributors. But Sonepar’s international growth is no less impressive.

In the past couple of years, Sonepar added operations in Spain, Germany, Italy, UK, Austria, the Netherlands, Romania, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Australia and the Czech Republic.

These have included Dielectro Industrial, with 19 branches in Galicia (northwest Spain), in May 2015; Alfa Elektriciteit in Belgium, March 2015; Van Egmond Group in the Netherlands, March 2015; Solar Deutschland in Germany, February 2015; Vanas Beyond Tools in the Flemish city of Antwerp (Belgium), January 2015; Gruppo Matel Spa in Italy and its sister company Eurosei in Romania, January 2015; HipTung Cables and Min Kwong Electric in Hong Kong and Macau, now part of Sonepar subsidiary Supermoon, December 2014; Dilon in Singapore and ETS-Oakwell in Thailand, joining Sonepar’s Oakwell platform business, December 2014; Routeco, with 13 branches across the UK plus operations in Austria and the Netherlands, September 2014; and BTF-Group joined Sonepar Deutschland in July 2014.