TVM Capital Mena has received approval from the Dubai Financial Services Authority to launch its first regional healthcare growth capital fund with USD40m of subscriptions from founding investors, Saudi Health Investment Company, the International Finance Corporation and GE Healthcare. TVM Capital Mena, the fund’s operator, is based in the Dubai International Financial Centre and is licensed and regulated by the DFSA. The fund will seek to capitalise on the growth opportunities in the healthcare service and pharmaceutical/life science sectors in the Middle East and North Africa region. On the services side, the focus will be on investments in specialised clinics,

2009 saw a steep decline in European financial services M&A activity with values, excluding government led deals, hitting their lowest levels for six years, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers. By contrast, the outlook for increased deal activity in 2010 is positive and the level of private sector activity is expected to increase significantly. Nick Page (pictured), partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers, says: “The level of deal activity in the European financial services market plummeted to a six year low in 2009. However, a restructuring-led wave of deal activity has started to gather momentum across the financial services industry and the private sector

Investec Private Bank’s private equity partner and fund finance team has provided a GBP8.2m loan to Encore Ventures, a new division of European venture capital firm DFJ Esprit. The two year loan facility financed all the management fees, set-up costs and legal fees of Encore 1, Encore Ventures’ first fund, which was established to manage the portfolio acquired in October 2009 from 3i for GBP170m.  Investec’s loan facility was structured to enhance the returns of the limited partners by ensuring that any capital drawn was used to buy assets rather than cover transaction costs. DFJ Esprit’s Encore 1 fund is

LS Power, a New York-based investment firm focused on the development, acquisition and management of power generation and transmission infrastructure, has selected SunGard’s Investran to help address its accounting needs for private equity administration. LS Power will use Investran for customer relationship management and investment and partnership accounting. Investran supports the entire investment lifecycle, from fundraising to reporting and portfolio monitoring, by automating front, middle and back-office processes for private equity and alternative investment firms. LS Power needed a solution that would help it to efficiently analyse, track and disseminate an increasing flow of transactional data. Investran aims to help

Private equity firm North Castle Partners has recapitalised flatbread maker Flatout in partnership with co-founders Stacey and Mike Marsh. Glencoe Capital’s Michigan Opportunities Fund participated on the recapitalisation, the terms of which were not disclosed. Founded over ten years ago, Flatout manufactures and markets healthy flatbreads, wraps, and snack crisps sold under its own Flatout brand to the grocery, mass, club store and food-service channels. "Providing consumers with healthy nutrition options is paramount to North Castle’s mission to build industry leading companies in the healthy living and aging market," says Chip Baird, North Castle’s managing partner. "We are proud to

Venture capital firms have agreed to sell their stake in Aardvark, an operator of a social search engine, to Google for approximately USD50m. The venture capital firms include August Capital and Baseline Ventures. Aardvark, founded by a group of former Google employees, has raised around USD6m in venture capital to date. The service lets users ask questions and get immediate responses from their friends.

Maven has led the public-to-private acquisition of AIM listed LitComp, an insurance business operating predominantly in the after the event insurance market. Maven investors have taken a 40 per cent stake in the newly de-listed business. The acquisition has been made by bidco Torridon Capital and is the culmination of 15 months of work by the Maven AIM team of Stella Panu and Kimberly Martin. Having originally supported the company at the time of its admission to AIM in 2006, they felt that the market had failed to reflect the intrinsic value and growth potential of LitComp and instigated the

Evercore Partners and Trilantic Capital Partners have formed an alliance to pursue private equity investment opportunities for Trilantic’s current fund and to collaborate on the future growth of Trilantic’s business. The relationship leverages the respective strengths of each firm while maintaining each firm’s independence. Trilantic, a private equity firm focused on middle market investments in North America and Europe, has a track record of investing in and building businesses. Trilantic currently manages two institutional private equity funds with an aggregate capital commitment of approximately USD3.9bn. Evercore’s M&A and restructuring advisory business and its private equity team will support Trilantic’s future

Eurazeo’s net asset value EUR64.2 per share at 31 December 2009, an increase of 34 per cent compared to 30 June 2009 and 20 per cent compared to 31 December 2008. Consolidated revenues for 2009 were EUR3,785m, a decrease of 5.9 per cent from 2008 on a comparable basis. Patrick Sayer, chairman of the executive board, says: “In an exceptionally difficult economic environment in 2009, the important work performed by group companies for over a year is beginning to produce results with an increase of more than 30 per cent in NAV since 30 June, to EUR64.2. The fourth quarter