Leading Asset Based Lender, Venture Structured Finance, has provided medical recruitment specialist DRC Group with an £11.5m funding package to assist its acquisition by James Caan’s private equity firm, Hamilton Bradshaw, via a BIMBO deal. Venture’s funding package comprised Receivables Finance with a Cashflow Term Loan.

The deal was originated, negotiated and led by Tristan Ramus, Managing Director of Hamilton Bradshaw. After being approached to provide funding, Venture swiftly gained an understanding of what was required and structured an £11.5m Receivables Finance package, combined with a Cashflow Term Loan. This combination was designed to refinance an existing facility, and was completed within four weeks, helping the BIMBO deal to go ahead with no delays.

DRC Group, which comprises the DRC Locums and Locumlinx companies, is the third largest supplier of locum doctors in the UK and is on the National Medical Framework Agreement. It has also recently been awarded multi-year preferential contracts to supply nurses, non-medical and non-clinical staff to the NHS and has enjoyed nine successive quarters of growth.

The deal sees Hamilton Bradshaw acquire 90% of the DRC Group and includes the majority of departing founder Darren Card and Finance Director Riaz Dhanji’s shareholdings. With DRC Group turnover currently exceeding £50m and 2010 revenue forecasts totalling over £80m, this deal will result in Hamilton Bradshaw’s 41 company portfolio surpassing annual revenues of £500m.

James Caan, CEO of Hamilton Bradshaw comments: “I am pleased that Venture Structured Finance was able to work so quickly to provide a suitable package. The funding line will allow for both instant and ongoing financial support. We are excited and energised about the prospect of working with DRC, which has maintained an excellent reputation in the market and feel that, working closely with DRC’s management team, we can help position the firm for substantial, mid-term growth.”

Patrick Wilkins, Regional Director, Venture Structured Finance added: “I’m proud of how we were able to develop a solution quickly to assist with the acquisition. The package will deliver an upfront cashflow boost as well as a source of readily available and flexible working capital providing extra headroom for the management team as it moves through the post-acquisition phase and beyond.”