The founders of Swiss private equity giant Partners Group Holding AG — Alfred Gantner, Marcel Erni, and Urs Wietlisbach — have made a significant move to complicate Switzerland’s proposed deal with the European Union, according to a report by Bloomberg.
An organisation backed by the trio has collected over 111,000 signatures to hold a separate vote on the rules for the EU accord, raising the threshold required for its approval. Under their proposal, the deal would need both a majority of Swiss citizens and majorities in more than half of the country’s cantons to pass. Whether this vote occurs before or after the EU referendum will determine its impact on the deal’s prospects.
Gantner, Erni, and Wietlisbach, former Goldman Sachs alumni, built Partners Group into one of Europe’s largest alternative asset managers, with $150bn in assets under management, spanning private equity, infrastructure, and real estate. While now focused on their family office activities, they remain major shareholders and limited partners in the firm.
Partners Group has stressed that the founders’ political engagement is a personal matter and does not influence the firm’s operations or investment strategy.
