Allocations
Gousto, a UK recipe box provider, has become only the fourth UK company in 2020 to achieve ‘Tech Unicorn’ status, following hot on the heels of Synk and fellow consumer-facing businesses Gymshark and Cazoo. Just eight years since launch, Gousto joins an elite group of 19 venture-backed UK businesses, including the likes of Deliveroo, that have achieved a valuation of at least USD1 billion.In its latest funding round, which closed on 30 Oct 2020, Gousto raised GBP25 million (USD 33m) of new equity from existing investors Perwyn and BGF at a valuation in excess of USD1 billion. The new equity
Eurazeo Capital, alongside IK Investment Partners, RAISE Investissement and the existing management team, has invested in Questel to acquire 100 per cent of its share capital. Eurazeo and the IK IX Fund will each invest an initial amount of nearly EUR200 million and together will hold a majority stake. Definitive financial information will be disclosed once the transaction has been completed.
Questel is a major intellectual property solutions provider that operates worldwide, developing SaaS products and an automated brand services and patent filing platform. The company works with close to 6,000 clients, including a number of large multinationals, offering end-to-end collaborative
Mid-market private equity firm LDC has backed Rhino Products, Europe’s leading manufacturer of light commercial vehicle accessories, in a deal valued at GBP36 million, to support its international growth strategy.Headquartered in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, Rhino is a designer and manufacturer of premium external load carrying and restraint systems for light commercial vehicles. Its innovative products are designed to address health and safety concerns of major fleet owners as well as providing high quality and reliable products for SMEs. With two factories in the UK and further dedicated sites in The Netherlands, Poland and Sweden, Rhino is an internationally recognised brand,
AnaCap Financial Partners (AnaCap), a specialist mid-market private equity investor, has entered into exclusive negotiations for the purchase of a majority stake in Market Pay, an innovative end-to-end omnichannel payments platform operating in multiple countries, from the Carrefour Group (Carrefour) in a deal valued close to EUR300 million.
The transaction is subject to the consultation of works council and to the usual closing conditions (including regulatory and antitrust approvals).
The deal, expected to complete in H1 2021, would see Carrefour retaining a minority stake in what will be a working partnership to commercialise the offering outside Carrefour, diversify product lines and
ARQIS has advised on the merger of the fitness studio chain Ai Fitness with the Jumpers Group, a portfolio company of NORD Holding. The client of ARQIS was Ai Fitness founder and seller Marius Neugebauer, who is taking a significant stake in the new group and is moving to the advisory board.
The two entities together form a new platform, the ‘BestFit Group’, which will focus on the growing premium discount fitness sector in Germany. The new group is a leading provider with well over 210,000 members, 64 studios and a strong presence in southern and western Germany. A comprehensive
LBO France, through its Small Caps Opportunities II fund, has acquired a majority stake in the French company Prenax. This move relates to the acquisition of the subscription management operations of LM Information (LM), based in Finland, and the takeover of one of its US subsidiaries (LM Inc). This deal with the management team of Prenax, which is re-investing substantially with the support of Andera Partners, will make it the leading independent European company in the sector.
Prenax, a business process outsourcing company founded in 1993, serves its clients – mainly large companies, but also government and university stakeholders – by
OnSite Waste Technologies, a specialist in the immediate sterilisation of medical waste, has closed an oversubscribed USD3.5 million Series A funding round. OnSite has now raised a total of USD8.5 million in capital, which has helped contribute to a 500 per cent, quarter-over-quarter growth rate.The latest round of funding was led by Mark IV Capital – a Newport Beach, California-based asset management firm focused on venture capital among other sectors. The capital raised from this funding round will be used to scale, build inventory and distribute the company’s TE-5000 immediate sterilisation desktop unit. Previous funding rounds focused on early stage
RealBlocks, a technology platform that enables access to alternative investments, has secured a USD7 million in a Series A financing round, bringing its total investment amount to USD10.7 million. The round was oversubscribed and led by new investor Crosslink Capital, a prominent venture investor based in Palo Alto that manages over USD1.8 billion in AUM with a focus on B2B, fintech, and SaaS. The new capital will allow RealBlocks to scale its business development and engineering teams as the company races to meet accelerating customer demand.
RealBlocks launched in 2019 with the aim of providing open access to alternative investments –
Key Capital Partners (KCP) has exited Hallam Medical though a management buy-out backed by ABN Amro, delivering a healthy return for investors.Sheffield-based Hallam Medical is a healthcare staffing business which deploys highly qualified nurses, largely Advanced Nurse Practitioners, Community Care Specialists and Telephone Triage Clinical Advisors.
KCP backed Hallam in April 2014 with a GBP3.3 million pound investment, which was used to crystallise some of the value the founding shareholders had built and provide working capital to accelerate the growth of the business.
Hallam CEO, Deborah McCain, says: “We have enjoyed a great relationship with the team at KCP. They
Technology-focused private equity firm Accel-KKR has closed its latest fund, Accel-KKR Emerging Buyout Partners LP at USD640 million, bringing Accel-KKR’s total assets under management to over USD10 billion.
“Despite the less-than-ideal conditions imposed by the pandemic, we completed a very efficient, successful fundraise almost completely during the lockdown,” Rob Palumbo, managing partner of Accel-KKR, commented on the fundraise.
Accel-KKR Emerging Buyout Partners LP Fund -which closed at its hard cap- comprised USD460 million in limited partner commitments and USD180 million in general partner commitments, and will continue Accel-KKR’s strategy of investing in software and tech-enabled services companies, with a
Events
12 November, 2026 – 8:00 am
12 November, 2026 – 5:00 pm
