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Clessidra to launch €600m fourth fund

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Italian private equity firm Clessidra is preparing the launch of its fourth buyout fund, which will have a target of around €600m and will start fundraising in the coming months, Unquote understands.

The fund will follow the same strategy as its predecessor, Clessidra Capital Partners III, which held a final close on €607.3m in December 2016.

The fund has currently only three companies in its portfolio: door designer and manufacturer Scrigno, which was bought by the GP in a €100m deal inked in May 2018; interior lighting specialist L&S, acquired in June 2019; and digital payment services specialist Nexi, which floated on the Italian stock exchange in a €2.3bn IPO in April 2019.

Clessidra Capital Partners IV will target Italian companies across the mid- and upper-mid-market, with an EV in the €150m-1bn bracket, operating in a wide range of sectors. Most of LPs from the previous vehicle are expected to re-up to this new fund.

The vehicle will be managed by a team led by Andrea Ottaviano, who joined Clessidra from L Catterton Europe in 2019 and was appointed as head of private equity.

Established in 2003, Clessidra is part of Italmobiliare, an Italian investment holding company controlled by the Pesenti family. The firm has completed 23 investments and 17 bolt-ons so far, and is currently deploying its third buyout fund.

In addition to its buyout vehicles, the firm is managing Clessidra Restructuring Fund (CRF), a €320m restructuring fund dedicated to bank credit with a special focus on unlikely-to-pay exposures, which held a first close in September 2019.

CRF is structured in two separate compartments: a credit section and a finance unit. The credit section includes the exposures provided to 14 Italian companies by 10 banks, including Amco (formerly SGA), BancoBPM, Banca Cremasca e Mantovana, Banco Desio, Credito Padano, BNL, BPER, La Cassa di Ravenna, MPS and UBI Banca.

The finance compartment comprises the capital raised by the fund from several Italian institutional investors – including pension funds, banks, holding companies and family offices – which will be used for the relaunch and development of the companies in its portfolio.

These are medium-sized Italian companies, with overall revenues of approximately €1.4bn and aggregated EBITDA of around €50m, that are currently undergoing a financial and industrial restructuring, despite a strong business model and high-growth potential.

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