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Aquila Capital has launched a new energy transition strategy, ETIF (Energy Transition Infrastructure Fund) which will invest in energy infrastructure assets that are essential to Europe’s energy transition.
Aquila Capital currently manages renewable energy generation assets with a capacity of about 2,200MW.
ETIF will pursue the three most important sub-sectors of the energy transition, namely renewable energy generation, energy storage and energy transportation. It is planned to launch the strategy as a Luxembourg-based Reversed Alternative Investment Fund (RAIF) with a target volume of EUR 750 million and a term of 12 years. The target net IRR is 8 per
Heartwood Investment Management, the asset management arm of Handelsbanken in the UK, has made three new appointments.
Siobhan Pandya has joined as Head of Investment Communications. Pandya is responsible for developing and implementing the content and marketing strategy for Heartwood. She has extensive experience of generating and managing cross-asset content, having previously spent seven years at M&G Investments, most recently as Head of Equities Market Content. Siobhan has also held roles at Henderson Global Investors, Merrill Lynch and JP Morgan.
Alistair Campbell and Nikki Howes have joined as Investment Associates. Campbell’s primary area of research is alternatives and he
Brightstar Capital Partners, a private equity firm that invests in closely held middle market companies, has closed its inaugural fund program in excess of GBP710 million of institutional capital from investors worldwide.
The sum is one of the largest first-time private equity fundraises in the last year, according to data from PitchBook. Commitments come from a diverse set of institutional investors including several university endowments, high net worth investors, pension funds, private foundations, family offices and insurance companies.
Andrew Weinberg, Brightstar’s Founder and Managing Partner, says: “We are gratified by the enthusiasm and extraordinary level of support the institutional
Global regulation has developed like a slow growing but increasingly powerful storm system over the last five years. And whereas big wave surfers welcome such conditions thanks to the epic waves it produces, there are, it could be argued, precious few C-suite executives relishing the equivalent regulatory waves being cast ashore.
Aberdeen Standard Investments and 21 Partners has formed a new UK-based 50:50 joint venture (JV) – 21 Aberdeen Standard Investments Limited (21ASI) – to launch a direct EUR1 billion private equity fund later this year.
The investment strategy for the fund will target active non-controlling interests with a focus on providing patient capital for the long term. The fund aims to support and facilitate growth in companies without owners ceding majority stakes in their business.
Beyond funding, 21ASI will provide portfolio companies with the support to help them manage challenges including managing their growth, the potential for disruption within
eFront’s latest quarterly private equity data shows that LBO performance reached a 10-year high in 2017, while overall risk levels reduced and average time to liquidity improved.
According to eFront, LBO funds posted their best performance in a decade in 2017, while multiples on invested capital of active private equity funds reached an all-time high in Q3 at 1.486x, marking the ninth year of improving performance from a low of below 1.1x in 2009.
Overall risk continues to reduce, as measured by TVPI spread, stabilising at 1.313x – close to the all-time low of Q2 2017 (1.275x) and well
Funds managed by Equistone Partners Europe (Equistone) have invested in BOAL Group, a designer and manufacturer of high-performance aluminium greenhouse roof and side-wall systems for glass and poly greenhouses.
Equistone will acquire a majority stake in BOAL Group from its current CEO Ronald Boers and the founder of the business, Marinus Boers, both of whom will retain a minority shareholding. BOAL’s management team will also acquire a minority stake in the business. The financial terms of the deal are undisclosed and the acquisition remains subject to clearance from anti-trust authorities.
Headquartered in Naaldwijk, the Netherlands, BOAL Group has 48
Clearlake Capital Group has completed fundraising for Clearlake Capital Partners V (Fund V) with over USD3.6 billion in commitments.
Fund V exceeded its target and was substantially oversubscribed, reaching its hard cap. At over USD3.6 billion, Fund V is Clearlake’s largest private equity fund to date. This brings Clearlake’s total cumulative capital commitments since inception to more than USD7 billion. Fund V has already begun investing with several signed or closed transactions including Perforce Software, Diligent Corporation, Janus International, ProVation Medical, and Wheel Pros.
“We are thankful and humbled by the opportunity to prudently invest on behalf of our prominent and expanding
ALFI comments on the EC proposal amending UCITS and AIFM Directives…
ALFI, the Association of the Luxembourg Fund Industry, has been engaged in the Capital Markets Union initiative from the outset and has actively responded to the European Commission’s 2016 consultation on barriers to the cross-border distribution of investment funds.
ALFI, as Europe’s largest investment fund hub, with a wide and long standing experience in cross-border distribution, acknowledges the intention and efforts of the European Commission in its recently published proposal amending Directive 2009/65/EC and Directive 2011/61/EU to remove barriers to cross-border distribution of collective investment funds while ensuring the
Drawdown rates for private equity funds are slowing, with managers taking longer to call down funds than they have in the past, according to data released by PitchBook from its PitchBook Benchmarks performance measurement product.
PE funds historically have called down more than 80 per cent of commitments by the end of their fourth year, but that has slipped to just 77 per cent for 2012–2015 vintage funds.
Venture capital funds, meanwhile, are deploying capital faster than ever. The average fund raised in the early 2000s called down less than 60 per cent of capital commitments by its third
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