French buyout firm PAI Partners and Goldman Sachs have agreed one of Europe’s largest buyouts since the credit crunch struck last summer by paying €2bn ($3.2bn) for German construction materials producer Xella International.

The winning consortium was formed between Goldman Sachs Capital Partners, the private equity arm of the US investment bank, and PAI only last month. It had to reassure the vendor, private German conglomerate Haniel Group, that it had the strategy and resources to take on its division.