Kester Capital, a UK lower mid-market private equity firm, is to sell its portfolio business, Vixio, a provider of global regulatory intelligence to the payments and gambling markets, to European private equity investor Perwyn.
The sale of Vixio will deliver a return on Kester’s investment of 4.8x and an IRR of over 60%. This represents Kester’s sixth consecutive exit over 3x and comes on the back of the sale of Avania earlier this year which delivered a return of over 8x.
The sale also marks Kester’s first exit from its current fund, Kester Capital II, which closed at its hard cap of £90 million in August 2020.
Perwyn’s acquisition includes a reinvestment by Vixio’s existing management team. As part of the transaction Gehan Talwatte joins VIXIO’s board of directors as independent chair. Talwatte is an experienced executive and director who has overseen the growth of several high-value intelligence services businesses across various industries.
