Timeline & History

K3 Capital Group Limited was incorporated on 14th February 2007 by Tony Ford and a co-investor, to acquire KBS Corporate (then called Knightsbridge Business Sales plc), a business broker and business transfer agent. At that time, KBS Corporate traded under two distinct brands of “Knightsbridge Business Sales” and “KBS Corporate”.

K3 was established as a holding company, under which it acquired 100% of the issued share capital of KBS Corporate from its founders.

In 2010, a new senior management team was formed as John Rigby was appointed to the role of Managing Director and Simon Daniels was promoted to Sales Director. In 2012, Andrew Melbourne joined the Group as Finance Controller, subsequently progressing to the role of Chief Financial Officer.

In 2013, a national legal partner relationship with Gateley was established to offer inclusive, fully contingent legal services to the Group’s clients. This has proved very successful, with 76% of KBS Corporate and 59% of Knightsbridge clients opting for this service, to date.

In 2014, KBS Corporate Finance was incorporated to offer a deal execution only and director led corporate finance service to larger mandates. At around the same time, KBS changed its name to KBS Corporate Sales Limited and Knightsbridge Business Sales Limited was incorporated to distinguish the trading brands.

During 2015, the Group launched CVS, an online portal to generate additional sales leads and collate contact and performance data of sale-intent businesses, companies and shareholders. Stuart Lees joined the board as Non-Executive Director in late 2015.

Since 2011, the number of staff has increased from 45 to over 145 by November 2018. In order to facilitate this growth and future planned expansion, the Group moved into its new 12,000 sq.ft. Head Office in 2016.

In March 2017, prior to Admission of the Company’s Ordinary Shares to trading on AIM, the Company acquired the business, goodwill and assets of Triskell, a provider of strategic and corporate finance advice to entrepreneurial companies.

In May 2018, Knightsbridge was rebranded to Knightsbridge Commercial to better reflect the target market of the brand. The rebrand was complemented by a fresh website and newly designed marketing collateral to provide comprehensive information about the refined service offering.

In June 2020, K3 Capital Group successfully completed a fundraising of £30.45 million in order to undertake acquisitions.

In June 2020, K3 Capital Group successfully acquired randd uk limited. randd is a UK based private company specialising in securing research and development (“R&D”) tax credits for clients.

In August 2020, K3 Capital Group completed the acquisition of Quantuma Advisory Limited. Quantuma is a UK-focused business advisory firm with overseas operations, specialising in corporate finance, financial advisory, pension advisory, forensic accounting and investigations, creditor services and restructuring and insolvency. Quantuma has a strong and experienced management team. Quantuma has demonstrated significant fundamental growth in recent years, underpinned by 35% revenue and normalised EBITDA CAGR over the last 3 years.

In August 2020, K3 Capital Group announced the appointments to the Board of Carl Jackson as Executive Director and Charlotte Stranner as Independent Non-Executive Director. In addition to these Board appointments, Martin Robinson was appointed as Senior Independent Director and Stuart Lees as Non-Executive Director.

In February 2021, the Group launched K3 Hub, an exclusive member-only referral network for professionals to provide K3 Capital Group’s specialist services to their own clients and complement their existing work.

In July 2021, K3 Capital Group completed the successful fundraising of £10.0 million in order to undertake further acquisitions.

In July 2021, the Group completed the acquisitions of Knight Corporate Finance Group Limited and Knight R&D Limited. Knight CF is a specialist M&A advisory firm within the telecoms, technology, and software sectors, and Knight R&D provides tax advisory services to UK SMEs.

In March 2022, the Group completed the acquisition of Professional Insight Marketing Ltd which trades as JE Consulting. JE Consulting is a full service marketing agency specialising in digital and creative services to SMEs operating in the accountancy, legal and healthcare markets. The acquisition complements the services of the K3 Hub, a centre for accountants in practice to access specialist advice, services and CPD training, available to K3 Hub members.

In April 2022, K3 Capital Group announced the appointment of Ian Symes, as its new Group Managing Director. Ian joins K3 from ManpowerGroup, where he was Executive Vice President and global leader of the Right Management brand, a HR solutions business employing more than 900 staff across 35 countries with revenues of more than $200m. Ian joins K3 with extensive international experience having led businesses across Europe and North America

In February 2023, K3 Capital Group announced that it has been acquired by an affiliate of Sun European Partners, LLP. The acquisition of K3 will benefit clients’ and employees alike, providing further investment in its existing businesses, driving growth through new technologies and additional resources, whilst providing access to capital that will enable K3 to continue its diversification through the acquisition of synergistic and complementary businesses.