Solutions
Stressfreecarrental.com – a new challenger in the online car rental market – has raised GBP534,000 in a funding round led by DSW Ventures and including angel investor Harry Dixon, former technical director at Rentalcars.com.
Stressfreecarrental.com operates a price comparison and booking platform for car hire and airport transfers. It aims to bring a fresh approach to product, service and technology and offer lower prices, improved transparency and better customer experience.
The Manchester-based company already operates in the UK, South Africa, Australia and the US. The investment will allow it to expand its team with the creation of 13 new
Independent Wealth Planners (IWP), a UK-wide group of independent financial advisers, has expanded its nationwide coverage with the acquisitions of Alex M Grant and Custodian Wealth Management.
Alex M Grant, based in Keith, north-east Scotland, joins IWP’s regional firm for Aberdeenshire, Buchanan and Associates, bringing across a total of GBP290 million in client assets. The firm is headed-up by founder and principal, Alex Grant, who has over 32 years’ experience providing independent financial advice to families and businesses.
Surrey-based Custodian Wealth Management was set up in 2004 by directors and financial planners, Branimir Gavrilovic and Richard Sutcliffe. Custodian, with
Fremman Capital (Fremman) has acquired a majority stake in Kids Planet Day Nurseries (Kids Planet), a UK-based, independently owned nursery operator.
Kids Planet, mostly clustered around the Liverpool and Manchester area (with a recent expansion to Oxford), was established in 2008 by Clare Roberts and her father John Hoban, in response to Clare’s own challenges of finding flexible childcare. With 82 sites, responsible for the education of over 7,500 children, Kids Planet is the largest independent private operator of nurseries in the UK, and third largest operator overall.
Since 2016, CEO Clare Roberts has led a number of acquisitions
Altus Group Limited, a provider of software, data solutions and independent advisory services to the global commercial real estate (CRE) is to acquire Scryer, Inc (dba Reonomy), an AI-powered data platform for the CRE industry, for USD201.5 million (approximately CAD249.5 million) subject to adjustments. The transaction is expected to close on 12 November, 2021.
Mike Gordon, Chief Executive Officer of Altus Group, says: “The combination of Reonomy’s AI-powered data platform with Altus’ suite of software, data and analytics capabilities creates a very compelling client offering that will enable our clients to better manage performance and risk within their CRE portfolios
Socure, a provider of digital identity verification and fraud solutions, has raised USD450 million in oversubscribed Series E funding round valuing the company at USD4.5 billion.
The company achieved a USD4.5 billion valuation just seven months after its USD1.3 billion Series D, on the back of 500 per cent year-over-year bookings growth and nearly USD1 billion of investment demand, earning Socure the highest valuation for any private company in the identity verification space.
The round is part of a Series E transaction led by Accel alongside funds and accounts advised by T Rowe Price Associates, Inc. It also includes
The Riverside Company is to sell its investment in Bohemia Interactive Simulations (Bohemia) to BAE Systems, one of the world’s largest defence contractors. Closing of the transaction will occur once regulatory approvals are secured.
Private markets firm Partners Group, on behalf of its clients, is to sell Pacific Bells, a franchisee of the Taco Bell brand in the US, to Orangewood Partners, a long-term focused private investment firm. The terms of the transaction have not been disclosed.
Founded in 1989 with the opening of a single Taco Bell outlet in Oregon, Pacific Bells now has over 250 restaurants and more than 6,000 employees in the US. Pacific Bells is the fifth largest Taco Bell franchisee in the country with a diversified national footprint across nine states. The Company has proved resilient through Covid-19, largely
Content Llama, Ireland’s leading content configuration technology (CCT) platform, has secured EUR2.5 million (USD2.9 million) in fundraising to further expand its presence globally and broaden its reach to potential customers.
DLA Piper has launched a global, dedicated end-to-end Investment Management and Funds practice offering to support to the entire investment management and investment funds value chain.
Co-led by International partners, Catherine Pogorzelski and James O’Donnell and US partners, Jesse Criz and David Parrish, the global dedicated practice builds upon the firm’s already well-established investment fund and investment management capabilities in the US, Europe and Asia by offering a global “one-stop shop” to serve the legal needs of asset managers, investment fund sponsors and investors across all industry sectors, geographies, asset classes and investment strategies covering:
• The full investment fund
Pollen Street Capital has agreed a sale of Aryza Holdings Limited (Aryza) to Atlas Bidco 1 Limited – a company owned by Macquarie Capital Principal Finance, Pollen Street, and Aryza senior management.
Aryza is a global provider of case management and process automation software solutions for regulated industries serving the insolvency, credit, and debt recovery sectors.
Pollen Street first invested in Aryza (originally known as Vision Blue) in 2017. Since then, Aryza has grown rapidly in size, breadth of offering and geographical footprint, now operating from six countries across three continents. More recently, Aryza has developed a platform for M&A
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