Analysis of 2025 Electrical Market M&A Activity Shows Sharp Increase in Rep Mergers
It was a comparatively quiet year for distributor acquisitions, but a flurry of rep mergers make headlines.
Distributor M&As
Electrical Wholesaling’s editors can’t remember a year when electrical distributors made fewer major acquisitions (see chart below). By our count, the only distributors acquired from the 2025 Top 100 ranking were Swift Electric Supply, Teterboro, NJ (Monarch Electric/USESI/CED); Warshauer Electric Supply, Tinton, Falls, NJ (Rexel USA); and Schwing Electrical Supply Corp., Farmingdale, NY (Rexel USA). Rexel USA’s purchases of Schwing and Warshauer added some major clout in the New York metropolitan area. The comparatively light M&A activity comes after a super-busy year in 2024, when at least 12 Top 100 distributors were acquired.
Independent rep M&As
Interestingly, it was independent manufacturers’ reps in the headlines this year with their mergers. One rep that has been particularly active on the M&A front is JD Martin Co., Houston, TX. It has acquired eight rep firms since 2018, including this year’s mergers with Utility Agency & Import (UAI Reps), Mansfield, TX, and WindShine, Oklahoma City, OK. JD Martin previously joined forces with the Schell Co., Mandeville, LA; Centauri Sales, Albuquerque, NM; I-Pro, Wheat Ridge, CO; Broomfield Lamb Holman, Loganville, GA; Integrated Component Sales (ICS), Winter Park, FL; Rhodes Electrical Sales, Bartlett, TN; and Vynckier Enclosures.
Three other big rep M&As were the moves by Bell & McCoy Companies, Houston, TX, to acquire Bob Jones & Associates, Phoenix, AZ, and the merger of Yusen Associates and A.A. MacPherson, two of the largest independent rep agencies in New England and upstate New York; and lighting rep SESCO Lighting’s purchase of NEXGEN Lighting Solutions, Carrollton, TX.
Electrical manufacturer M&A activity
It probably shouldn't come as a surprise that many of the 2025 manufacturer acquisitions involved companies acquiring firms with a specialty in the data center market.
These acquisitions included Littelfuse’s acquisition of Basler Electric, Highland, IL, a manufacturer of electrical control and protection solutions for grid and utility infrastructure, power generation and data centers; Legrand’s acquisition of Avtron Power Solutions, Cleveland, OH, a manufacturer of load banks and power quality solutions for data centers and other critical applications; Hubbell’s purchase of DMC Power, Carson, CA; a provider of high-voltage connectors; the Eaton acquisitions of Resilient Power Systems, an Austin, TX-based provider of solid-state transformer technology and other energy solutions and its purchase of Fibrebond, an enclosure manufacturer based in Minden, LA; and ABB Electrification Canada’s purchase of Bel Products, an enclosure manufacturer.
