Patrimonium holds €100m first close for debut fund

The fund target is €200m, with a hard-cap of €225m. The vehicle is targeting a gross money multiple of 2.5x and a 20% IRR.

The vehicle is structured as a Luxemburg SCSp and was registered in August 2018. It has market-standard 2-8-20 conditions and has a lifespan of 10+2 years. 

Clifford Chance is providing legal advice and PwC is the placement agent. 

"We did most of the preparation and personal meetings for the fundraise before the virus hit, so it had no impact on the first close," Werner Schnorf, managing director for private equity at Patrimonium, told Unquote. 

Asked about the final close, Schnorf said: "We will make the final close within 12 months. It's important for fundraising that you can meet in person. We had a lot of meetings before the first close and we need the follow-up meetings to be in person, but we don't yet know how long this will take, since every country will not follow the same sequence in terms of opening up again. On the other hand, we have good contacts through our private debt group, we have a lot of great investors who trust Patrimonium and we have contacts ready to use." 

Investors 
The fund was marketed to Europe-based institutional investors including funds-of-funds, pension funds, insurance companies and family offices. The minimum commitment for institutional investors was €5m. 

The first close is backed by European and Swiss institutional investors and family offices. Schnorf said: "We have 10 LPs backing the fund, four are big tickets and then there are some smaller ones. We are also backing the fund ourselves with €10m.

"We have pan-European institutional investors, including a Swiss bank, and we also have family offices. There is likely to be a maximum of 10 more LPs for the final close." 

Investments 
The fund plans to invest in DACH-based lower-mid-market companies with turnover of €20-150m and enterprise values of €10-120m. 

The vehicle will focus on value creation via digitalisation strategies and will also pursue buy-and-build strategies. Schnorf explained: "Our strategy is strongly focused on buy-and-build. We will need some dry powder to build the platforms, but we will aim for 7-10 platform investments.

"We also like to have co-investors, meaning we can have quite sizeable ticket sizes for the lower-mid-market. We will deploy tickets of €15-35m, and at the upper end we would co-invest." 

Asked about the fund's sector focus, Schnorf told Unquote: "We are industry agnostic, but there are certain areas that we like, including business services and construction industry suppliers. We also have a strong network in healthcare, including companies relating to the ageing population. We also have a certain affinity to financial services as a large asset manager." 

"It's great timing to have capital and to have a fund in the current vintage to do investments into a downturn. We feel comfortable and our investors or potential investors feel the same way," added Schnorf. 

People 
Patrimonium – Werner Schnorf (managing director, private equity).

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