Eos set to deploy in lower-mid-market following fund close

Peter Winkler, Philipp Wegener and Thomas Röhrl founded Eos in 2015. Winkler previously worked at BCG and EQT, while Wegener has prior experience at EQT, Hg and JP Morgan. Röhrl has a background in the technology sector, specialising in digitalisation strategies.

The Munich-headquartered GP held a final close for its first fund in September 2020, as reported.

Eos has a portfolio of five companies; three of these investments were made prior to raising the fund. The firm acquired industrial automation business Variotech in October 2016, followed by data software company CSP in November 2017 and business training services provider MST in July 2018.

"We founded the firm in 2015 and did deal-by-deal investments at first," said Winkler. "We financed Variotech, CSP and MST with a group of senior PE partners and our own money. We saw after a couple of years that the opportunity was really there on the smaller end of the spectrum. MST was our last pre-fund deal – we wanted to execute more deals, and for that we needed a fund."

"The fundraising process started in February 2019 and we held a first close September 2019," said Winkler. "Prior to February 2020, when Covid-19 hit, we had raised €120m. Our LP base includes European and US institutions, endowments, family offices and funds-of-funds, as well as private individuals from the German market."

The GP began to deploy the fund prior to the final close. "We have made two deals from the fund so far: Brunner, a medtech components company; and a company in the Kindergarten space," said Winkler. The fund will target companies with enterprise values of €10-60m and EBITDA of €1.5-6m. The vehicle plans to make 10 deals in total.

The firm sees a number of opportunities in the lower-mid-market. "The pipeline is full, but these days it's hard to say what the pace of deployment will be," Winkler added. "We think the next 12-18 months will be a good time to make deals."

Asked if the fund has a specific sector focus, Winkler told Unquote: "The world was different when we started raising the fund. We have no clear sector focus, but we need to bring something to the table to help the businesses we invest in grow, such as supporting the entrepreneurs and founders, and investing in sales and marketing structures."

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