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Wheb Ventures, a European clean technology venture capital firm, has invested EUR3m in Torqeedo, a developer of electric outboard motors.
This is the first investment by Wheb Ventures’ Munich office, which opened in April 2009, and gives Wheb Ventures a significant stake in Torqeedo.
Wheb Ventures led the EUR4.7m investment round. The Brose Trust and other existing investors also participated.
Torqeedo, established in 2005 and headquartered in Starnberg in Bavaria, develops and manufactures electric outboard motors for the marine market. The motors provide a viable and environmentally friendly alternative to the sub ten horse power combustion engine outboard market.
JHP Group, one of the UK’s largest private sector providers of vocational education, skills training and employability programmes, has been bought by its management team in a transaction backed by mid-market private equity firm LDC.
Founded by Hugh Pitman in 1983, Coventry-based JHP operates a national network of 57 centres as well as delivering training in employees’ workplaces nationwide.
The business services more than 3,000 clients, from small and medium sized companies to major organisations such as the Ministry of Defence, RBS Insurance, Royal & Sun Alliance and Barclays.
Led by chief executive officer Jim Chambers, its management
The Managed Funds Association is planning to gather information from hedge funds, funds of funds and managed futures funds for use in its industry education and advocacy efforts using PerTrac P-Card.
P-Cards are secure email attachments that can contain an array of manager-designated data such as strategy descriptions, investment terms, portfolio exposure data and investment returns.
Richard H. Baker (pictured), MFA president and chief executive, says: "As the primary source of industry information for policy makers, the media and the public, it’s important that we collect and aggregate data in a confidential and timely manner from as many managers as
Siguler Guff, a private equity firm with over USD8bn in assets under management, has appointed Solomon Owayda as a managing director.
The firm will leverage Owayda’s private equity experience to provide investment solutions to investors and to cultivate and manage advisory relationships.
Owayda says: “This is a great opportunity to join a successful private equity firm like Siguler Guff and to work with a talented group of professionals. I have known individuals at the firm for a long period of time and have always been impressed by their vision and their ability to identify opportunistic trends in a timely manner.”
The Bahamas has concluded Tax Information Exchange Agreement negotiations with 23 countries, signed ten agreements and will meet the G20/OECD’s March 2010 deadline of a minimum of 12 signed agreements.
To date, The Bahamas has signed ten TIEAs with the US, Great Britain and Northern Ireland, China, France, New Zealand, Argentina, Belgium, the Netherlands, Monaco and San Marino.
TIEA negotiations have been successfully concluded with Germany, Canada, Spain, Mexico, Australia, South Africa, South Korea, and the seven Nordic countries of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Greenland and Faroe Islands.
Signature on agreements by countries with whom The Bahamas has concluded
Private equity firm Mid Europa Partners is extending its tender offer to purchase any and all of the outstanding ordinary shares of Invitel Holdings, par value EUR0.01 per share, and any and all of its American depositary shares.
As of 7 January 2010, a total of approximately 2,332,601 Invitel shares and Invitel ADSs had been tendered in the offer and not withdrawn.
Together with the 12,450,393 Invitel shares already owned by Mid Europa, this represents approximately 88.4 per cent of the outstanding Invitel shares.
The offer and withdrawal rights will now expire at 12:00 midnight, New York City time,
Charges are stacking up against Raj Rajaratnam, founder of the Galleon hedge fund group who is accused of making at least USD36m in profits through deals that depended upon inside information.
US prosecutors appear to be expanding the scope of the investigation and looking to find more participants in insider trading willing to cut deals that involve naming names in exchange for immunity or more lenient sentences.
Some commentators are not hesitating to compare the Rajaratnam scandal with that in the late 1980s, immortalised in the film Wall Street, which ensnared arbitrage trader Ivan Boesky and junk bond king
Private equity fundraising has had its worst year since 2004, with only USD246bn raised by 482 funds worldwide in 2009, according to research by Preqin.
This is 61 per cent down on the USD636bn raised in 2008 and 62 per cent down on the record USD646bn raised in 2007.
Q4 2009 represents a low point for the year, with only USD35bn raised by 75 funds – the lowest quarterly total since Q3 2003.
Of the USD246bn raised in 2009, buyout funds raised the most capital, with USD102bn raised by 84 funds. A total of 170 venture funds raised USD27bn, while
Private equity firm The Carlyle Group has acquired Brazilian tour operator CVC Brasil Operadora e Agência de Viagens from founder and chairman Guilherme Paulus.
Paulus will remain chairman of CVC and will retain a significant minority equity stake in the company.
CVC is headquartered in Santo André, Brazil and is the largest tour operator in Latin America.
The transaction closed in late December 2009 and included the tour operator and the cruise ship businesses of CVC. The other companies controlled by Paulus – the airline WebJet, the hotel management company GJP and the advertising agency GP7 – were not included.
Resilience Capital Partners, an Ohio-based private equity firm, has publicly released its online Resilience Benchmark software.
The benchmarking process identifies the best practices in industry niches in relation to a company’s products and processes, both within an industry and outside it, with the object of using this as a guide and reference point for improving the practices of one’s own organisation.
Steven Rosen, co-chief executive of Resilience Capital, says: "The Resilience Benchmark is an internal tool we have used since we founded the firm to assist us in identifying areas for operational performance improvement and the direct immediate opportunities available
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