Asia Pacific’s population of high net worth individuals fell 14.2 per cent to 2.4 million in 2008 amid a global economic downturn and market volatility, according to a report from Merrill Lynch Wealth Management and Capgemini. The combined wealth of the region’s high net worth individuals dropped 22.3 per cent

Venture capital firms Tamir Fishman Ventures, Carmel Ventures, The Challenge Fund II and Motorola Ventures are planning to sell their stake in CopperGate Communications, to Sigma Designs. Both CopperGate and Sigma are US-based developers of system-on-a-chip semiconductors. The total transaction is valued at USD160m. The estimated amount of cash to

Conning, a provider of asset management and consulting services to the insurance industry, has been acquired by funds managed by Aquiline Capital Partners, a New York-based private equity firm investing in the financial services sector. “We are pleased to close this transaction with Aquiline. This is a very exciting time

Amarin has entered into a definitive agreement with several existing and new institutional and accredited investors for a USD70m private placement. The private placement of units for USD70m consists of USD66.4m in cash proceeds and USD3.6m from the conversion of convertible bridge notes.  The financing was led by existing investor,

SEI has signed ten new collective investment trust managers over the past eight months. According to Cerulli Associates, CITs represented about USD733bn in employer-sponsored retirement plans, including defined benefit and defined contribution plan assets as of 30 June 2009. SEI has specialised in the CIT market for more than 15

Environmental Capital Partners, a New York based private equity firm, has made an investment in Cascade Drilling in order to fund the company’s future growth initiatives.  Bruce Niermeyer, Cascade Drilling’s founder, remains a significant shareholder and will continue as president and chief executive.  Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Fortress Investment Group has priced RailAmerica’s initial public offering of 10,500,000 primary shares of common stock at USD15 per share. A further 11,500,000 secondary shares of common stock of RailAmerica are being offered by RR Acquisition Holding, an entity wholly-owned by certain private equity funds managed by an affiliate of

GI Partners has completed the final closing of its third private equity fund, GI Partners Fund III. Since the fund’s launch, over USD1.9bn in capital commitments was secured in less than one year from institutional private equity and real estate investors. The aggregate size represents a 35 per cent increase