Balmer Lawrie & Co Valuation Multiples

Linde is the largest industrial gas supplier in the world, with operations in over 100 countries. The firm's main products are atmospheric gases (including oxygen, nitrogen, and argon) and process gases (including hydrogen, carbon dioxide, and helium), as well as equipment used in industrial gas production. Linde serves a wide variety of end markets, including chemicals, manufacturing, healthcare, and steelmaking. Linde generated approximately $34 billion in revenue in 2025.

Booking is the world's largest online travel agency by sales, offering booking and payment services for hotel and alternative accommodation rooms, airlines, rental cars, restaurants, cruises, experiences, and other vacation packages. The company operates several branded travel booking sites, including Booking.com, Agoda, OpenTable, Rentalcars.com, Kayak, and Momondo. Transaction fees for online bookings account for the bulk of revenue and profits.

Airbnb is a global online marketplace connecting hosts offering homes or experiences with guests seeking short-term accommodation and travel activities. It earns service fees on bookings while providing discovery, payments, trust, customer support, and marketplace infrastructure. The company serves customers and counterparties through the operating assets, products, or financial capabilities described in the cited transaction materials. Its economics are driven by marketplace, while its competitive position depends on sector expertise, asset quality, customer relationships, and disciplined capital allocation. The company is classified in Accommodation and Online Travel and Consumer Marketplaces because those categories best represent its principal activity at the transaction date. This profile is intended to identify the legal or operating business involved in the deal, including a historical name where the company was later renamed, merged, privatized, or reorganized.

As the world's largest parcel delivery company, UPS manages a massive fleet of more than 500 planes and 100,000 vehicles, along with many hundreds of sorting facilities, to deliver an average of about 22 million packages per day to residences and businesses across the globe. UPS' domestic US package operations generate around 65% of total revenue, while international package makes up 20%. Air and ocean freight forwarding and contract logistics make up the remainder.

Sherwin-Williams is the largest provider of architectural paint in the United States. The company has over 4,800 stores and sells premium paint at higher price points than most competitors. Sherwin-Williams also sells paint-related products in big-box stores and provides coatings for original equipment manufacturers.

Ecolab produces and markets cleaning and sanitation products for the industrial manufacturing, data center, hospitality, healthcare, and life sciences markets. The firm is the global market share leader in this category with a wide array of products and services, including dish and laundry washing systems, pest control, and infection control products. Additionally, Ecolab sells customized water management and cooling solutions across its end markets. The company has a strong hold on the US market and is growing its presence abroad.

Nan Ya Plastics Corp manufactures and sells a variety of polyester and electronic products. The company engages in the manufacture and sale of plastic products, polyester fibers, petrochemical products, and electronic materials. Geographically, the company generates a majority of its revenue from Taiwan and the rest from China and other markets.

Canadian National's railway spans Canada from coast to coast and extends through Chicago to the Gulf of Mexico. In 2024, CN generated CAD 17 billion in revenue by hauling intermodal containers (22% of consolidated revenue), petroleum and chemicals (20%), grain and fertilizers (20%), forest products (11%), metals and minerals (12%), automotive shipments (5%), and coal (5%). Other items constitute the remaining revenue.

Deutsche Post is a company whose business is German postal and parcel-delivery group operating within DHL Group. The organisation is based in Bonn and operates with sector-specific employees, commercial relationships and delivery infrastructure. It serves households, companies, online retailers and public-sector mail users. Its products and services are used in Germany and international logistics markets through postal, parcel and freight networks. The company earns revenue through services, reflecting the way customers purchase its offering. Management coordinates product development, sales, operations and customer support for the relevant market. The business is an operating company rather than an investment vehicle, even where a financial sponsor owns shares. This profile describes the transaction-period entity and avoids conflating it with similarly named companies, subsidiaries or current parent groups. The description supplies the operating context required to interpret its role as a target, platform or acquirer in the documented transactions.

FedEx pioneered overnight delivery in 1973 and remains the world's largest express package provider. In fiscal 2025, the firm's Federal Express segment—which houses the core package delivery operations—made up 86% of total revenue, with 10% coming from FedEx Freight, its asset-based less-than-truckload shipping segment. The remainder came from other services, including FedEx Office, which provides document production/shipping, and FedEx Logistics, which provides global forwarding. FedEx acquired Dutch parcel delivery firm TNT Express in 2016, boosting its presence across Europe. TNT was previously the fourth-largest global parcel delivery provider.

Shin Etsu Chemical is an industrial conglomerate that was founded in 1926. Some of its largest product groups are silicon metal, polymer, silicone, rare-earth, and cellulose products. It holds top rankings in several markets, notably as the largest PVC and silicon wafer producer globally. Shin-Etsu is most exposed to the construction, semiconductors, and pharmaceutical sectors. Shin Etsu employed 27,274 people as of March 31 and has production bases in 17 countries.

Since its founding in 1940, Air Products has become one of the leading industrial gas suppliers globally, with operations in 50 countries and 19,000 employees. The company is the world's largest supplier of hydrogen and helium. It has a unique portfolio serving customers across industries, including chemicals, energy, healthcare, metals, and electronics. Air Products generated roughly $12 billion in revenue in fiscal 2025.

BASF is one of the world’s leading chemical companies. It's headquartered in Germany near the Rhine River, which helps with logistics-related savings. Founded in 1865, it produces a vast array of chemicals, plastics, resins, and agricultural solutions. While the company serves multiple industries, it most prominently serves the automotive, agricultural, construction, and pharmaceutical industries. BASF is a first mover in the energy transition and aims to rapidly expand its recycled and bio-based product portfolio.

Denmark-listed A.P. Moller-Maersk operates trade, shipping, logistics, and terminal assets globally. The oceans segment, the largest contributor to group revenue and earnings, has the second-largest oceangoing shipping capacity globally. Maersk has acquired several logistics firms in the past couple of years and plans to make the segment the company's growth engine. Over the past few years, Maersk has divested noncore operations, including its long-standing stakes in Danske Bank and Dansk Supermarked, as well as its oil and gas operations and ocean towing.

DSV is a Danish-listed transport and logistics company, offering transport services worldwide by road, air, and sea, with the bulk of its activities coming from airfreight and sea freight forwarding businesses. Since its founding in 1976, the company has experienced rapid growth, primarily through strategic acquisitions. Its most recent acquisition, DB Schenker, occurred in the second quarter of 2025, making DSV the largest sea freight forwarder.

Spun off from Roche in 2000, Givaudan is one of the world's leading flavor and fragrance manufacturers, with a presence in more than 80 countries. It sources more than 11,000 different ingredients from over 100 countries. The company serves end consumer markets with fragrances for personal, home, and laundry care brands, including prestige perfumes. In flavors, customers are in beverages, savory, snacks, sweet goods, and dairy. Givaudan has nearly 10,000 employees, and its perfumery team is the largest in the industry.

Poste Italiane is the Italian postal and financial services group, headquartered in Rome and listed on Borsa Italiana, where it is part of the FTSE MIB index. It runs mail, parcel and contract logistics, the BancoPosta financial services division, Poste Vita and Poste Assicura in insurance, PostePay in payments and mobile telephony, and asset management through BancoPosta Fondi. Cassa Depositi e Prestiti holds 35 percent of the capital and the Ministry of Economy and Finance 29.26 percent. The group has about 120,000 employees and a network of roughly 12,700 post offices, and reported revenue of EUR 13.1 billion and net income of EUR 2.2 billion for 2025. It has acquired companies and stakes in payments, logistics, insurance, data and asset management, including LIS, Plurima, Sourcesense and Net Insurance, and in 2026 it took control of the telecoms operator TIM through a public tender and exchange offer.

Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone Ltd is a port infrastructure company domiciled in India. The company owns, operates, develops, and maintains port terminals and port infrastructure in India, including operating and developing infrastructure at the Special Economic Zone in Mundra. Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone also owns and operates a private railway to transport container cargo, and provides storage, handling, and other logistics services. It has one business segment, namely developing, operating, and maintaining the ports services, ports-related Infrastructure development activities, and development of infrastructure at the contiguous Special Economic Zone at Mundra. The company generates the vast majority of its revenue domestically.

Old Dominion Freight Line is the second-largest less-than-truckload carrier in the United States (following FedEx Freight), with roughly 260 service centers and 11,000-plus tractors. It is one of the most disciplined and efficient providers in the trucking industry, and its profitability and capital returns are well above those of its peers. Strategic initiatives focus on increasing network density through market-share gains and on maintaining industry-leading service (including ultralow cargo claims) through steadfast infrastructure investment.

COSCO SHIPPING Holdings Co Ltd is an investment holding company. The company's operating segments include the Container shipping business, Terminal business, and Corporate and other operations. It generates maximum revenue from the Container shipping business segment. Its geographical segments include America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Mainland China, and Other international markets.

SABIC is a global Saudi chemicals and materials producer manufacturing petrochemicals, polymers, fertilizers and specialty products. The organisation serves customers and counterparties in B2B markets through products, infrastructure, services or investment activity suited to its sector. Its operating model generates income through product sales, depending on the business line and transaction period. The company is classified here using the historical entity that existed when the investment occurred, rather than a later owner or successor brand. This description is intended to distinguish the transaction target from similarly named entities and to give enough business context for a standalone database record. SABIC serves B2B customers through activities spanning Chemicals. Its commercial model generates revenue through Product sales, supported by sector expertise, operating execution and customer relationships.

Established in 1910, Sika produces specialty chemicals primarily used by the construction sector (85% of sales). Its products are mainly used for bonding, sealing, reinforcing, and protecting in the construction and automotive industries. Approximately 70% of its products have a positive impact on sustainability for customers. Sika has a global manufacturing footprint of more than 400 factories spread across over 100 countries.

Kuehne+Nagel is a global transportation and logistics company founded in Switzerland in 1890. Kuehne+Nagel is the second-largest sea freight forwarder globally and will hold a top-three spot in air freight. Sea freight has traditionally accounted for the largest part of the business, contributing 40% of the group's revenue in 2024. The company aims to become a more balanced, fully integrated freight forwarder, continually improving its end-to-end offering to clients.

Novonesis was formed in 2024 through the merger of Novozymes and Chr. Hansen. Following the merger, the company became the world leader in industrial enzymes and microbial solutions, with a nearly 50% market share in both. The firm supplies a wide range of industry groups: household care, food and beverages, bioenergy, agriculture and feed, technical and pharmaceuticals. Its biological solutions create value for its customers by improving yield efficiency and performance, while saving energy and generating less waste. The company is headquartered in Denmark, employs more than 11,000 people, and works across more than 30 research and development and application centers and 23 manufacturing sites.

Wanhua Chemical Group Co Ltd is engaged in the development, production, and sales of polyurethane and additives, isocyanate and derivative products; the sales of liquefied petroleum gas, propylene, acrylic acid, and other petrochemical products.

DSM-Firmenich is a global science-based company formed in 2023 through the merger of DSM, a Dutch nutrition, health, and sustainable living player, and Switzerland-based Firmenich, the third-largest player in the flavor and fragrance market. The company serves a wide range of end-consumer markets providing nutrition solutions ranging from medical and early-life nutrition, fragrances for personal-, home-, and laundry-care brands, prestige perfumes, and other ingredients for food and beverage, home, and personal care. DSM-Firmenich has nearly 30,000 employees, with more than 2,000 scientists and engineers spread across 15 research and development facilities.

International Container Terminal Services Inc is a container-handling and terminal company. The company operates, manages, develops, and acquires container terminals to handle import and export cargo shipped in containers. Besides, the firm provides storage, container stripping and stuffing, and maintenance services. The company organises itself into three geographical segments: Asia; Europe, Middle East, and Africa; and Americas. The company derives the majority portion of revenue from the Asia segment, followed by the Americas and EMEA.

OMV AG is an international, integrated oil and gas company that operates in the Energy, Fuels and Feedstock, Chemicals segments and Corporate and others. The company has exploration and production assets in a multitude of countries in Europe, Asia, and Africa. The Energy segment engages in the business of oil and gas exploration, development and production. The Fuels and Feedstock segment which generates key revenue, refines and markets crude oil and other feedstock. The Chemicals segment provides circular polyolefin solutions and base chemicals, fertilizers, and plastics recycling. Geographically, the company generates a majority of its revenue from Austria and the rest from its operations in Germany, Romania, Norway, France, the Netherlands, and Other Countries.

German-listed Hapag-Lloyd AG operates global trade, shipping, inland services, and terminal assets globally. Hapag-Lloyd liner shipping, the largest contributor to group revenue and earnings, has the fifth-largest shipping capacity globally. Hapag also provides a range of services, including e-business solutions, inland services, and terminal operations.

Based in the US, Expeditors International of Washington is a non-asset-based third-party logistics provider, mainly focused on international freight forwarding. Its offers freight consolidation and forwarding, customs brokerage, warehousing and distribution, purchase order management, vendor consolidation, and numerous other value-added logistics services. It employs sophisticated IT systems and contracts with airlines and ocean carriers to move customers' freight across the globe. The firm operates more than 200 full-service office locations worldwide, in addition to numerous satellite locations. Expeditors derives around 35% of consolidated gross revenue from airfreight, 30% from ocean freight, and 36% from customs brokerage and other services.

Ems-Chemie Holding AG is a holding company that, through its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells a variety of chemical-based products. The firm organizes itself into two segments based on product type: High-Performance Polymers and Specialty Chemicals. The High-Performance Polymers segment, which generates the majority of revenue, sells plastic products to the automotive, electrical, and electronics industries. The Specialty Chemicals segment sells fibres, bonding agents for tires, and fusible bonding yarns for textiles and powder coating products. Geographically, the majority of its revenue comes from Europe and the rest from Asia, the Americas, and other regions.

Qnity is a specialty chemicals company created in 2025 after being spun off from DuPont. It sells chemicals and materials to the semiconductor industry, which generates the majority of sales, and also the electronics industry. Qnity specializes in materials science, including supplying key materials required to manufacture semiconductors and interconnected devices.

PPG is a global producer of coatings. The company is the world's largest producer of coatings after the purchase of selected Akzo Nobel assets. PPG's products are sold to a wide variety of end users, including the automotive, aerospace, construction, and industrial markets. The company has a footprint in many regions around the globe, with less than half of sales coming from North America in recent years. PPG is focused on its coatings and specialty products and expansion into emerging regions, as exemplified by the Comex acquisition.

Ningxia Baofeng Energy Group Co Ltd is engaged in the production and sales of modern coal chemical products. The company operates through four segments. The Coking Products segment covers coal mining, washing, and coking activities. The Fine Chemical Products segment focuses on coal tar, crude benzene, and C4 deep-processed products. The Olefin Products segment is involved in the production of methanol and olefins. The Headquarters and Other Product segment manages investment, financing, and support services, alongside the activities of its commercial service companies. It generates the majority of its revenue from the Olefin Products segment.

Coca-Cola Femsa, a subsidiary of Femsa, is the largest franchise bottler of Coca-Cola in volume terms. The company purchases beverage concentrates and syrup from Coca-Cola, which it then processes and packages for distribution through modern trade, traditional trade, and the on-premises channel. Mexico and Brazil make up 80% of the total volume and sales, with the rest from other Central and South American countries, including Panama, Guatemala, Uruguay, and Argentina. Femsa and Coca-Cola hold 47% and 28% economic interests in Coca-Cola Femsa through nonpublicly traded A and D shares, respectively, while controlling 56% and 33% of the voting power.

International Flavors & Fragrances is the largest specialty ingredients producer globally. It sells ingredients for the food, beverage, health, household goods, personal care, and pharmaceutical industries. The company makes proprietary formulations and partners with customers to deliver custom solutions. Through its taste and scent segments, which each generate around 25% of profits, IFF is a leading flavor and fragrance producer. The health and biosciences business, which generates 30% of profits, is a global leader in probiotics and enzymes. The remaining profits come from the food ingredients business, which sells texturants, plant-based proteins, and other ingredients, though IFF plans to divest it in a deal expected to close in 2027.

SF Holding was the largest logistics integrated service provider in China and Asia, and the fourth largest globally in 2025 by revenue, according to Frost & Sullivan. It is the only large integrated logistics service provider in Asia that has direct control of its operations with minimal reliance on network partners. It is also independent of any e-commerce platforms. The company is equipped with full-product service capabilities in time-definite express delivery, economic express delivery, freight, cold chain and pharmaceutical, intracity on-demand delivery, international express delivery, international freight and forwarding, and supply chain.

Following the spinoff of its contract logistics division (GXO) in 2021 and freight brokerage operations (RXO) in 2022, XPO is moving closer to becoming a pure-play asset-based less-than-truckload carrier. We estimate LTL shipping makes up 60% of total revenue, with XPO's European truckload and LTL operations making up 40%. However, XPO's LTL segment EBITDA mix is much higher than 60%. We believe XPO intends to divest its European trucking division once it finds the right buyer.

Dow Chemical is a diversified global chemicals producer, formed in 2019 as a result of the DowDuPont merger and subsequent separations. The firm is a leading producer of several chemicals, including polyethylene, ethylene oxide, and silicone rubber. Its products have numerous applications in both consumer and industrial end markets.

Smurfit WestRock manufactures corrugated packaging and consumer packaging, such as folding cartons and paperboard. After the merger of Smurfit Kappa and WestRock in summer 2024, Smurfit WestRock became the largest producer of containerboard in the world, with substantial operations in North America, South America, and Europe.

J.B. Hunt Transport Services ranks among the top surface transportation companies in North America by revenue. Its primary operating segments are intermodal delivery, which uses the Class I rail carriers for the underlying line-haul movement of its owned containers (48% of sales), dedicated trucking services that provide customer-specific fleet needs (27%), for-hire truckload (6%), heavy goods final-mile delivery (7%), and asset-light truck brokerage (12%).

Packaging Corp. of America is the third-largest containerboard and corrugated packaging manufacturer in the United States. It produces over 5 million tons of containerboard annually. The company's share of the domestic containerboard market is roughly 10%. PCA differentiates itself from larger competitors by focusing on smaller customers and operating with a high degree of flexibility.

Amcor is a packaging company that develops and produces flexible packaging, rigid plastic containers, specialty cartons and closures for food, beverage, pharmaceutical, medical-device, home-care and personal-care customers. It traces its origins to paper milling businesses established around Melbourne in the 1860s, which were consolidated as Australian Paper Mills in 1896 and renamed Amcor Limited in 1986. The group is incorporated in Jersey, headquartered in Zurich and listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the Australian Securities Exchange. It grew through large acquisitions, among them Schmalbach-Lubeca's rigid packaging business in 2002, parts of Alcan Packaging in 2010, Bemis in 2019 and Berry Global in April 2025. After the Berry combination it reports about 75,000 employees and annualised sales of around US$23 billion from more than 400 locations in over 40 countries. Its corporate venturing arm invests between US$250,000 and US$5 million in packaging start-ups.

LyondellBasell was formed through a merger between Basell (a joint venture between BASF and Shell) and Lyondell, which was a major chemical producer dating back to the 1950s. Notably, the firm filed for bankruptcy in 2009 after the merger, following a heavy debt burden taken on for the 2007 merger. It was reorganized as LyondellBasell NV and relisted in 2010. LyondellBasell has five reportable segments, after exiting refining in 2025: olefins and polyolefins Americas (O&P A), olefins and polyolefins Europe-Asia-International (O&P EAI), intermediates and derivatives (I&D), advanced polymer solutions (APS), and technology.

Brambles is the world’s largest supplier of reusable wooden pallets for the fast-moving consumer goods, fresh produce, beverage, retail, and general manufacturing industries. Brambles' services primarily operate under the Chep brand. The operation spans approximately 60 countries with three geographical segments: Chep Americas, Chep Europe, Middle East, and Asia, and Chep Asia-Pacific.

Shanghai International Port (Group) Co Ltd is the world's largest container port in terms of throughput volume, and a major trans-shipment hub in China. It engages in handling port containers and bulk cargo along with other container-related services in the Yangtze River Delta. The gross profit in core port operation is approximately 72% in containers, 2% in bulk cargo, and 26% in port logistics and services. The Shanghai state-owned Asset Supervision and Administration Commission holds approximately a 44% stake in SIPG.

Borouge PLC is a petrochemical company that provides solutions of polyolefins such as polyethylene and polypropylene for a wide range of industries such as packaging, infrastructure, energy, mobility, agriculture, and healthcare. Geographically, the company derives maximum revenue from PRC and has a presence in India, UAE, Austria, Egypt, Pakistan, and other countries.

Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Kaisha is a Japan-based shipping and transportation company. The company operates through seven segments. The Automotive Business covers ocean-going cargo shipping and automobile logistics. Dry Bulk Cargo Business focuses on bulk cargo transport and ship chartering. Energy Business handles shipping and chartering related to energy transport. Liner & Logistics Business includes Air Transport, Liner Shipping with agency, container terminal, port, and tugboat operations, and Logistics covering warehousing, freight forwarding, and coastal freight. Other Business involves real estate leasing and sales, passenger ship services, machinery and equipment wholesale, transportation support, information processing, and petroleum product sales.