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London and New York-based venture capital investor Octopus Ventures has appointed ecommerce entrepreneur and former management consultant Zihao Xu as an associate in the firm’s investment team.
The team is best known for backing the likes of Secret Escapes, eve Sleep, SwiftKey and Zoopla Property Group.
Xu joins Octopus Ventures from Roland Berger Strategy Consultants with six years of consultancy experience spanning across the aerospace, defence, automotive, industrials and private equity sectors.
Xu is founder of a sunglasses and lifestyle brand, Canopy Sunglasses. Founded in 2014, he has responsibility for every aspect of the business including strategy, sourcing, branding and web development. Canopy Sunglasses has
Cyprium Partners, a non-control private equity firm, has made a subordinated debt and equity investment in Irvin Automotive Products.
The investment was used to facilitate an acquisition of the business by Detroit entrepreneur Vinnie Johnson from Takata Corporation.
Irvin will operate separately from Piston Group, another automotive business owned by Johnson, and will continue to be run by Irvin's current management team led by Joseph Finn.
The investment is the 12th transaction from the firm’s Cyprium Investors IV fund, which closed in December 2014.
Founded in 1922 and headquartered in Michigan, Irvin is a manufacturer of automotive
Asset management has always been an information-based business and as such, managers are not immune to facing innovative and disruptive forces making inroads in other industries.
Such is the pace of technological innovation, and data volume, that fund managers now have the chance to leverage the same predictive capabilities as used by Google (and other search engines) into their organisations to better understand investor behaviour and derive insights across all facets of their business. But it’s no easy task. To do so requires having a clear data strategy in place to build value and ultimately improve the client experience.
Abacus Group, a provider of hosted cloud IT solutions for alternative investment funds, has opened a second London data centre.
Tom Cole, director of client services and business development in London, says the new data centre will allow Abacus to provide resilient services to current clients and expand its capabilities to onboard more alternative investment funds.
Abacus currently serves 18 funds in the UK and more than 300 globally. The company’s employee count recently exceeded 100.
Abacus, co-headquartered in San Francisco and New York, is adding London to its growing list of locations in Boston, Charlotte, Greenwich, Los
Private equity fund manager YFM Equity Partners has invested GBP5.3 million in TravelTek, a Scottish technology business which provides packaging technology to travel agents, tour operators and wholesalers worldwide.
The investment has been made by the VCT and LP funds managed and advised by YFM.
Founded in 2002, TravelTek provides travel retailers, agents and wholesalers with the technology to package together an extensive range of hotels, flights, cruises and ancillary travel services in one transaction.
TravelTek has delivered a near 250 per cent increase in sales in the last four years from its offices in Scotland, England, Australia
Phoenix Wrappers has secured an equity investment from Vopne Capital, a private investment firm based in San Francisco.
Concurrent with Vopne's investment, the company merged its manufacturing, sales and support operations, formerly owned separately, into one company.
Phoenix Wrappers is a designer and manufacturer of stretch wrapping equipment. Formerly Phoenix-Innotech and CanAm Packaging Systems, the company is a fully integrated provider of stretch wrapping equipment, parts, service and support.
Phoenix Wrappers is led by CEO Graham Nicholson, former head of CanAm Packaging.
Nicholson says: "Phoenix Wrappers has a history of manufacturing industry-leading stretch wrapping equipment known for its
Bill Salus has launched consultancy firm Paddock Consultancy, which aims to assist financial services companies with growth and management challenges.
New York based Salus (pictured) has over 30 years of experience in executive management in the investment and asset servicing industry.
Most recently global chief executive officer for Apex Fund Services, he has also held senior positions at BNYMellon, PNC Global Investment Servicing, KeyCorp and Security Pacific Bank and was a member of the ICI International Operations Advisory Committee.
Salus says: “Setting up Paddock feels like a natural step for me at this time. There is currently a great
SecureKey Technologies, a provider of identity and authentication solutions, has raised CAD27 million in growth capital to fund the commercial rollout of a privacy-enhancing digital identity network.
Teaming up with SecureKey on the initiative and participating in the funding round are BMO Bank of Montreal, Bank of Nova Scotia, CIBC, Desjardins, Royal Bank of Canada and TD.
Building upon the SecureKey Concierge federated authentication service, SecureKey and its partners aim to accelerate the development of a new service to be launched in 2017. The new service will make it easier for consumers to manage their digital assets and to take control
Comcast Ventures, the venture capital affiliate of Comcast Corporation, has hired Dinesh Moorjani as managing director based in Santa Monica.
A serial entrepreneur, senior operating executive and successful seed investor, Moorjani will lead investments across various sectors, including data and business intelligence, marketplaces and social networks.
“I am delighted to welcome Dinesh to Comcast Ventures,” says Amy Banse, managing director and head of funds at Comcast Ventures. “We are building a team of smart, proven investors with knowledge and success across a variety of sectors. Dinesh brings unique experience that bridges later stage private equity transactions with an accomplished
Lawson Conner, a provider of fund launch services, a regulatory hosting platform and capital introductions, has appointed Michael Denoon-Slater as head of capital introductions.
He assumed responsibilities on 3 October 2016 and will be responsible for developing this new business across Europe, Asia and North America.
Prior to joining Lawson Conner, Denoon-Slater founded Strathspey Partners, a London based boutique advisory firm, which specialised in capital introduction and business development globally for alternative investment funds.
Denoon-Slater has over 20 years’ experience within the global financial sector and has spent the past 10 years working in prime services and hedge funds for Citigroup and Boyer Allan Investment
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