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As traditional Hollywood studios struggle to assemble funding – MGM has been forced to postpone the 23rd film of the James Bond franchise because of debt problems – more and more financiers are looking to the independent film fund model for reliable returns, according to Guernsey-based tax expert Ben Tustin.
Investment opportunities in films range from pre-sales contracts to tax credits, direct equity investment, gap and bridge finance, completion funds, publicity and advertising.
Each stage has its own balance and level of risk and reward. Direct equity investment has been historically common but is not the most lucrative or
Brookfield Asset Management has appointed Chris Harris as client relations manager for the private funds group.
Harris will be responsible for Brookfield’s relationships with investors in the western US.
Prior to his appointment, Harris served a director in the private placement team at Macquarie Capital for three years, working on development of new funds and overseeing client investments in real estate, private equity and infrastructure.
Before that, he spent two years as director of institutional marketing at Citi Property Investors.
“We are delighted to welcome Chris as a senior member of our global relationship team,” says Leo van den Thillart,
CallMiner, a provider of enterprise speech analytics, has closed USD4m in series C financing from Sigma Partners, Intersouth Partners, Inflexion Partners and an undisclosed partner.
CallMiner plans to use the proceeds to fuel its growth and expansion activities.
Terry Leahy, CallMiner’s president and chief executive, says: “CallMiner’s industry leading speech analytics platform – Eureka – continues to gain rapid traction in the marketplace as evidenced by two consecutive years of triple digit marquee customer growth and corresponding revenue growth. As CallMiner enters 2011, we are poised to capture an even larger share of the market with our advanced enterprise speech
Crescent Financial Partners has purchased a minority stake in IT Trading’s proprietary quantitative trading software for USD3.2m.
The software, which has been under development for nearly a decade, employs a statistical arbitrage trading model.
“In the finance world, arbitrage is commonly known as the practice of taking advantage of a price difference between two or more markets,” said John Indelicato and Anthony Tuozzo, creators of the software. “Essentially what our software does is automates this process through the use of advanced sophisticated algorithms.”
Russell Armstrong, chief executive and managing director of Crescent Financial Partners adds: “We believe this algorithm is
John DelPonti has joined the valuation and financial risk management practice of Navigant Capital Advisors, a wholly owned subsidiary of Navigant Consulting, as a managing director in the Washington, DC office.
DelPonti will focus on providing strategy, operations and risk management services to mortgage banking clients.
“The mortgage industry is undergoing a unique transformation, and our clients are demanding insight into how to best position their business to address this change,” says Richard Hitt, managing director and leader of Navigant Capital Advisors’ valuation and financial risk management practice. “John’s combination of mortgage strategy, valuation, risk management, transaction and operational experience
Arsenal Capital Partners’ portfolio company Novolyte Technologies, a manufacturer and supplier of specialty electrolyte materials for lithium ion battery and energy storage applications, has created a joint venture with Foosung, a producer of specialty lithium salts for lithium batteries.
The joint venture platform will create an integrated producer of lithium battery electrolytes, a key component in the rapidly growing market for lithium batteries used in hybrid electric vehicles and consumer electronics.
The US-based joint venture entity will retain the Novolyte Technologies name and will be managed by Novolyte’s current management team from its existing Cleveland headquarters.
Concurrent with the formation
Aquiline Capital Partners, a New York-based private equity firm investing in financial services, has made a USD225m investment in CRT Capital Group, an independent institutional broker-dealer based in Stamford, Connecticut.
The investment, which also includes funds from CRT’s management, will expand the firm’s balance sheet with the objective of building a full-service broker-dealer.
Founded in 1989, CRT is a sales, trading and research firm led by institutional brokerage veterans Ben Carpenter and Ron Kripalani.
CRT plans to expand its team and the products and services it currently provides to nearly 1,000 institutional clients. In the near-term, CRT will focus
Market conditions are now providing opportunities for private equity managers and their investors in selective areas of the market, according to research produced by professional services company Towers Watson.
The research asserts that portfolio company operating performance is stabilising, pricing for new deals is becoming more compelling from a buyer’s perspective and financing packages are increasingly available for the right businesses.
"A flurry of deal activity announced in early 2010 is testament to the potential for transactions to be created for the right businesses if managers have the skill and capacity to aggressively seek new deals," says Mark Calnan, global
Galtere, a US registered investment manager, has launched an agribusiness private equity strategy that aims to take advantage of a fundamental shift in global market dynamics and a growing worldwide demand for commodities from institutional investors.
The agribusiness strategy makes direct investments in industrial scale commodity production facilities in Brazil, Uruguay and Australia.
The strategy employs a long-term investment horizon of seven years to increase efficiency, production and profit of its projects, before monetising its investments via trade sale or IPO.
Galtere is aiming to raise USD1bn of assets from institutions, endowments and family offices.
The strategy is lead-managed
Irving Place Capital, a middle-market private equity firm, has signed a purchase agreement to acquire Alpha Packaging, a blow molder of plastic bottles and jars for the nutraceutical, pharmaceutical and personal care markets.
Irving Place Capital is investing in partnership with Alpha’s current management team, led by president and chief executive officer Dave Spence and chief operating officer Dan Creston.
The transaction is expected to close in September of 2010.
Alpha, which is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, manufactures plastic bottles and jars at five manufacturing facilities located throughout the US, as well as a recently-opened plant in the Netherlands.
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