The Fire and Security Market Is Consolidating. Here's What That Means for Owners Sitting on the Fence

The Fire and Security Market Is Consolidating. Here's What That Means for Owners Sitting on the Fence

James Dixey — Founder and Managing Director    ·    8 min read    ·    James Dixey Limited

PE-backed buy-and-build platforms are now driving around 70% of UK fire and security M&A (Grant Thornton, 2025). For owner-managers, the next eighteen months is probably the most competitive window the sector will see for some time.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

•  The pace of UK fire and security consolidation has accelerated through 2025 and into 2026. PE share of deals is at a sector high and the supply of quality businesses lagging the demand for them.

•  At least six active platforms are buying in the sector right now, with three new ones in formation. The right process puts your business in front of more than one of them simultaneously — and that is what moves price.

•  Maintenance revenue, accreditation and second-tier management are the three variables every buyer scrutinises. Median sector multiples sit around 9x EV/EBITDA, with premium businesses (above-60% recurring revenue, current accreditation, £500k+ EBITDA) clearing 8–10x and exceptional outcomes reaching 11x.

•  The window does not stay open forever. Every consolidation wave eventually hits the point where platforms are full, multiples drift down, and the early-mover advantage closes. We are not at that point yet — but the conversation is worth having now, not later.

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If you have run a fire and security business for the last decade, you will have felt the change without necessarily seeing it in numbers. The phone rings more often. The buyers approaching you are bigger, better-funded and more professional than they used to be. The competitor down the road who you thought would never sell, sold last year — to a name you had never heard of, that turned out to be a private equity-backed group buying its eleventh acquisition.

This is not your imagination. The UK fire and security sector is going through one of the most concentrated waves of M&A activity any service market has seen in the last decade, and 2026 is shaping up to be busier than 2025. For owners thinking about whether and when to sell, the question is no longer whether the buyer pool is active — it is whether you are positioned to take advantage while the window is open.

Why private equity has decided this is its sector

Private equity drove around 70% of all UK fire and security M&A in 2025 according to Grant Thornton's facilities services tracker — against 46% across the wider facilities services market — and the pace has not slowed entering 2026. The reasons are now well-rehearsed in PE investment committees: the sector is large, deeply fragmented, regulatory demand is structurally rising rather than discretionary, and the typical owner-managed business has the kind of recurring revenue profile that supports buyout economics.

The active platforms are visible if you know where to look. andwis Group, the H.I.G. Capital portfolio company, has completed 29 acquisitions since March 2023 and four in 2026 alone, most recently Senseco Systems in April. Ranger Fire and Security, backed by Hyperion Equity Partners, has done 21 deals since its launch in February 2024 — including three announced on 18 May 2026 (iFire in Edinburgh, Henderson Fire and Safety in Galway, FireCheck in Warrington) — with a £150m Apera debt facility in place since January 2026 underwriting the next phase. Obsequio Group changed hands in October 2025: Warren Equity Partners acquired the platform from Beech Tree Private Equity at over £70m of revenue and 630 staff, with two further bolt-ons (Atlas World, PLP Fire Protection) completed alongside the recapitalisation. New Path Fire & Security, backed by Duke Capital, has completed seven acquisitions to date from its Southampton base, focused on London and the South of England. On the passive side, Checkmate Fire — the UK's largest passive fire specialist — transacted from YFM to IK Partners in March 2024, and remains the platform play in that segment. There are several more besides — EA-RS (Rockpool), Marlowe Fire & Security, Walker Fire, Spy Alarms (Phoenix) — and at least two new platforms in formation.

What this means for an owner is straightforward: there is more than one credible buyer for your business, the right process generates competitive tension, and you are no longer in a market where you have to take the first offer that arrives.

Why your maintenance book is the real asset

The single number a fire and security buyer will scrutinise more than any other is the proportion of your revenue that comes from recurring maintenance contracts. Installation revenue is welcome but lumpy. Reactive call-outs are unpredictable. The maintenance book — annual or multi-year service agreements with a high renewal rate — is what underpins the multiple.

The arithmetic is simple. A £2m business with 30% maintenance revenue and 70% installation will trade at a meaningfully different multiple to a £2m business with 60% maintenance revenue and a 90% renewal rate, even if the headline EBITDA is identical. For context, the median fire and security transaction multiple has trended to circa 9x EV/EBITDA, with quality recurring-revenue assets at the top of that range and installation-heavy businesses meaningfully below it. Owners who have built their business that way over the last five years are the ones now seeing the strongest competitive interest. Owners who have not are not locked out, but they need to either tell the maintenance growth story credibly with hard numbers, or accept that the multiple will reflect the mix as it sits today.

If you are eighteen to twenty-four months from a possible sale, the highest-return work you can do today is grow the recurring book. Every pound of additional contracted maintenance revenue is worth several times its face value at exit.

Passive fire — the segment that has come from nowhere

The other structural shift worth flagging is the rise of passive fire protection as a distinct and increasingly valued sub-sector. Five years ago, passive fire — fire stopping, compartmentation, cladding remediation, fire doors — was a niche specialism inside a broader trade. Post-Grenfell, the Fire Safety Act 2021 and Building Safety Act 2022 have pushed it into the centre of the regulatory framework, and buyers have followed.

If you operate primarily in passive fire, or have a meaningful passive fire capability inside a broader business, the buyer pool now includes platforms specifically formed to consolidate this segment — Checkmate Fire under IK Partners is the most visible, but Ranger has been actively building its passive capability through Fire Door Specialists and Total Fire Group, and andwis has passive capability across multiple subsidiaries — alongside the broader F&S consolidators expanding into it. The competitive dynamics are different from active fire and security — fewer buyers, but more concentrated demand, and often higher multiples paid for the right asset because the supply is genuinely scarce.

Accreditation is the moat buyers actually pay for

Fire and security buyers are paying for two things they cannot easily build themselves: a recurring revenue base, and the regulatory permissions to serve it. The accreditation stack matters more in this sector than in almost any other service market.

NSI Gold and SSAIB at the top of the security side. BAFE for fire detection and alarm work — particularly SP203-1 for fire detection and alarm installation — are the baseline expectation for any business operating in the active fire space. FIRAS and IFC certification for passive fire installation. Third-party certification to the relevant British Standards. ISO 9001, 14001 and 45001 are all expected. Buyers walking into a process will check every certificate, the dates, the audit history, and any non-conformances. A clean accreditation record is genuinely a moat. A patchy one will cost you money, sometimes through indemnity rather than price reduction, but always somewhere.

The work to put this right is unglamorous but mechanical. If a sale is on the horizon, audit yourself before the buyer's auditor does.

What this all means for your timing

Multiples in the sector have trended upwards for several years and remain near the top of their range. Buyer balance sheets are full of capital that has to be deployed. The supply of quality businesses coming to market is tighter than the demand. None of this lasts forever — every consolidation wave eventually hits the point where the platforms are full, the multiples drift down, and the easy money has been made.

No one can tell you exactly where in the cycle we currently sit. What we can tell you is that for an owner-managed fire and security business with strong maintenance revenue, clean accreditation and a credible second tier of management — particularly in the £3–15m enterprise value range where we focus — the next twelve to eighteen months is probably the most competitive window the sector has seen, and possibly will see, for some time. The accreditation and maintenance-book work above is part of a broader pre-sale prep checklist.

Related: The five things most likely to kill a sale before it even starts.  (/insights/five-things-that-will-kill-your-business-sale)

Considering selling in the next eighteen months?

The right starting point is a confidential conversation about what your business is worth in this market, who the realistic buyers are, and what twelve months of preparation could add to the price. The first call costs nothing.

Book a confidential call  →

SOURCES

[1] Grant Thornton facilities services M&A tracker (2025): PE share of UK fire and security deals at approximately 70% in 2025, against approximately 46% across the wider facilities services market.

[2] Wilson Partners F&S sector commentary (2025): median UK transaction multiple of approximately 9x EV/EBITDA; listed comparables trading at approximately 7.4x.

[3] andwis Group acquisition pace: company press releases and trade press coverage 2023–2026; 29 acquisitions since the H.I.G. Capital partnership in March 2023.

[4] Ranger Fire and Security: company announcements 2024–2026 and Hyperion Equity Partners news page; 21 acquisitions since February 2024 launch (three latest — iFire, Henderson, FireCheck — announced 18 May 2026); £150m Apera debt facility announced January 2026.

[5] Obsequio Group: Warren Equity Partners acquisition press release and trade press coverage, October 2025; recapitalised at £70m+ revenue and 630 staff with bolt-ons Atlas World (Belfast) and PLP Fire Protection (Chatham).

[6] New Path Fire & Security: company website and Duke Capital portfolio disclosures; seven acquisitions since the 2022 partnership.

[7] Checkmate Fire: IK Partners portfolio announcement, March 2024; YFM exit confirmed in trade press coverage.

[8] Regulatory framework: Fire Safety Act 2021, Building Safety Act 2022; accreditation references to BAFE SP203, FIRAS, IFC, NSI Gold, SSAIB, ISO 9001/14001/45001 are standard sector terminology.

James Dixey Limited — Specialist M&A for regulated, owner-managed businesses in Care, Education, Fire & Security and Other Regulated Services.