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Finnish venture capital firm Superhero Capital has announced the first close of its second fund at EUR30 miollion. The fund will make seed investments in Finland and the Baltics and aims to invest in 25 startups over the next four years. The fund will remain open for new investors until the end of 2020.
The fund targets startups that create competitive advantages by refining data into insight. Superhero refers to startups that fit the bill as being ‘insight-driven’.
“There has been a lot of talk about data being the new oil. But how much is data really worth before
Chicago-based private equity firm Kinzie Capital Partners (Kinzie), through an affiliated entity, has acquired Chelsea Lighting NYC (Chelsea).The transaction was completed in partnership with the Company’s management, including Thomas Ike, Brian Horigan and Eric Martin, who will maintain significant ownership interest in Chelsea and will continue to hold key management roles at the Company, with Ike serving as CEO, Horigan as COO and CFO and Martin as the General Counsel and CAO.
Founded in 1994, Chelsea is currently the largest independent lighting and lighting controls distributor serving the New York City market where it supplies the real estate, design
Levine Leichtman Capital Partners (LLCP), a Los Angeles-based private equity firm, has partnered with management to acquire Tropical Smoothie Cafe. Tropical Smoothie Cafe is a leading franchisor of fast casual cafes with over 870 units across 44 states. The Company inspires a healthier lifestyle by serving better-for-you smoothies, wraps, sandwiches, and flatbreads across multiple dayparts. Tropical Smoothie Cafe was founded in 1997 and is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.
The Company will continue to be run by the existing executive team led by CEO Charles Watson. According to Matthew Frankel, Managing Partner of LLCP, “We are excited to partner with Charles and
By Rodrigo Tavares, founder and president of the Granito Group – With fewer regulatory requirements compared with listed equity, the global USD4 trillion private equity market is lagging behind other asset classes when it comes to the adoption of ESG strategies.
Despite reports of a moribund UK economy, the UK insurance sector has proven its resilience, with M&A activity continuing unabated, according to Clearwater International.The large-scale consolidation of the UK market, which has been running for many years, appears to be continuing. Interest in M&A is likely to continue, as investors view the insurance market as a robust sector and as such have invested in consolidation platforms, most of which have deep pockets funded in part by significant debt facilities. By its very nature, insurance is likely to be less affected by economic uncertainty albeit there may be some downward pressure
Renatus Capital Partners, an investor in Irish SMEs, has agreed to make a significant minority investment in CRS Mobile Cold Storage to support the business’s growth plans.First founded in 1992, CRS is today led by brothers John Tyrrell (Managing Director) and Patrick Tyrrell (Technical Director). The business is a market leader in the provision of modular temperature-controlled storage solutions to the food and pharmaceutical sectors. From its headquarters in Co. Meath, it provides solutions to blue-chip clients across Ireland, the UK and mainland Europe.
Former Suretank CEO John Fitzgerald is joining the board as non-executive Chairman and is investing
HIG Capital (HIG) has expanded its European Middle Market LBO team with the addition of Rohin Jain as a Managing Director and Nishant Nayyar as a Principal. Both will be based in HIG’s London office. Rohin has over 15 years of experience in private equity covering a wide range of sectors, regions and investment strategies. Prior to joining HIG, he led the Healthcare Sector Team at Triton Partners. Prior to that, he worked at Mistral Equity Partners and UBS Investment Bank.
Nishant has over 13 years of private equity experience, investing across the technology sector, including tech enabled services, telecoms,
AppyWay, a kerbside management and smart parking technology firm, has launched a GBP20 million Series B funding round, which will be used to support organic growth of the platform, strategic acquisitions, further technological investment and international scalability.AppyWay is helping to difitalise and integrate what is a highly fragmented, but high potential, market for mobility. In the UK, the government has invested well over £200 million into connected and autonomous vehicles (CAV) research and development since 2014, as well as several billion pounds into infrastructure investment for electric vehicles. In the UK, the mobility market is already valued in the billions
Private equity firms’ knowledge of the insurance market and strategic use of cover remains relatively limited, according to research undertaken by Gallagher, one of the world’s largest insurance broking, risk management and consulting services companies.In Q1 this year, just 17 per cent of firms reported a comprehensive knowledge and awareness of the insurance market and use of cover for capital efficiency. Comprehensive knowledge levels were similarly low among US and UK-based firms, falling to 13 per cent for Asia-based firms. A higher proportion of respondents from larger funds (28 per cent) reported higher levels of knowledge.
Just half (51
Mid-market private equity investor LDC has invested more than GBP 17million into Beekman Associates, a developer and provider of the data-driven marketing procurement platform RightSpend. The deal will help the management team to drive organic growth, further develop its software as a service (SaaS) offering and continue to expand into new international markets.
Headquartered in London and with a second office in New York, Beekman Associates and its industry-leading software platform RightSpend supports global brands in the assessment of their marketing activity in real time, to help save and optimise marketing spend and manage agency relationships more effectively. The business has
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