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O2 Investment Partners has appointed Luke Plumpton to its Investment team. Plumpton will be responsible for evaluating, structuring, negotiating and financing transactions, as well as monitoring O2’s portfolio companies.
Prior to joining O2, Plumpton was the Director of Strategic Planning for Hanford Pharmaceuticals, a contract manufacturer and global supplier of aseptically processed antibiotics. His primary responsibilities included new business development and managing turnaround and cost cutting initiatives for the company. Prior to Hanford, Plumpton was instrumental in the buildup of Square 1 Bank, a venture debt bank serving high growth life sciences and technology companies. Prior to Square 1, he
By Simon Gray – A debate is underway in Luxembourg about whether this civil law country, already a major European hub for private equity acquisition and transaction vehicles, should wholeheartedly embrace the Anglo-Saxon common law concept of the limited partnership in order to seize a larger share of the global market for fund vehicles.
At the centre of the discussions is the Société en Commandite Simple (Secs), a pass-through vehicle, with the objective to create a limited partnership on the model of the UK partnership. An industry working group is examining whether this structure could be adapted to create a
By Olivier Sciales and Rémi Chevalier – Luxembourg’s private equity industry faces a range of challenges but also opportunities as a result of the implementation of the European Union’s Directive on Alternative investment Fund Managers, which was agreed by the European Parliament in November 2010 and formally adopted by the EU Council, following a lengthy tidying-up process, in May 2011.
The directive aims to create a single European internal market for alternative fund managers and a harmonised regulatory framework for all alternative managers active within the EU, whether they are based within the union or not. It does not regulate
By Simon Henin – If there’s such a thing as a winner from the recent economic downturn and the growth of regulation in the private equity industry, arguably one might be Luxembourg.
As private equity investors have become more cautious, fund managers have looked for reputable and well-regulated jurisdictions to domicile their funds – and this has played to Luxembourg’s strengths. Its EU membership status has also gone down well with managers with a European investor base in the light of the forthcoming AIFM Directive.
This has certainly been our experience. A specialist private equity fund services firm, Ipes established
By Simon Gray – The advent in July 2013 of the European Union’s Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive could help Luxembourg to consolidate its position as a domicile and servicing centre for private equity funds and acquisition vehicles, according to industry members and analysts in the grand duchy.
Luxembourg is best known as a centre for retail funds established under the EU’s Ucits regime, which allows funds established in one member state to be freely marketed to investors throughout the 27-country bloc as well as other members of the European Economic Area. Its total fund assets of EUR2.22trn at the
Tradition Midstream has closed a USD200 million equity commitment from Denham Capital. The funding will help the company take advantage of the increasing need for new and expanded infrastructure required by the continued growth of natural gas, natural gas liquids and crude oil production in the United States today.
“There is a tremendous opportunity for an established midstream management group to assist producers and consumers in developing, constructing and operating infrastructure in emerging shale plays across the US,” says John O’Shea, CEO of Tradition. “Tradition’s team has an excellent track record of providing value-added solutions for our customers by serving
Private equity firm Insight Venture Partners has provided equity financing for digital photo business Photobox’s GBP120m (USD195m) acquisition of Moonpig.
of Photoways Holdco Ltd, a vehicle owned by digital photo business PhotoBox, in connection with the acquisition by Photobox of Moonpig for £120 million (US$195 million).
The cash component of the purchase price for the Moonpig acquisition consisted of equity financing from Insight, Greenspring Associates and Quilvest, as well as from certain existing shareholders of Photobox, and debt financing from UK lenders.
Dewey & LeBoeuf represented Insight in the equity financing and also provided assistance to PhotoBox’s Photoways Holdco on the debt financing
Secondary private equity firm Paul Capital has acquired an interest in a portfolio of private equity assets managed by alternative asset manager Cognis Capital.
The transaction, approximately EUR70 million, is comprised of 20 mostly European assets across a diverse range of industry sectors. The Paul Capital investment, made through Ffenics I Fund LP, a newly formed vehicle, will also provide follow-on capital to the existing investments. This transaction provides liquidity to investors but also granted them the option to rollover their investment into the new fund.
“Cognis has built a promising portfolio and we are delighted to partner with their
Venture Capital Bahrain Fund, the first SME investment fund in Bahrain, has partnered with vBuildings Co WLL, a smart building and grid solutions business led by entrepreneurs Mohamed Radhi and Ahmed Bayoumi. Venture Capital Bahrain Fund was established by Venture Capital Bank with contribution from the Bahrain Development Bank and a group of private investment companies interested in developing the local economy.
vBuildings was established in Bahrain to provide innovative solutions to utility and telecom companies, and real estate developers and managers. It designs, sources and implements competitive smart building services and smart grid solutions built on flexible IT platforms
Middle-market private equity firm Huntsman Gay Global Capital has completed the sale of Grand Isle Shipyard, Inc (GIS), an offshore oilfield maintenance services company to NANA Development Corporation. Huntsman Gay closed its debut USD1.1 billion fund in July of 2009, and the sale of GIS is the firm’s first realisation from the fund. Terms of the private transaction have not been disclosed.
GIS, based in Galliano, Louisiana, is an industry leader with 17 locations throughout the Gulf Coast and Texas providing a broad range of services to large global and mid-major oil production companies. Its services include offshore platform maintenance,
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