News
UK - Octopus backs £9.75m MBO of Tristar
Octopus Investments has invested ТЃ4.8m to support the ТЃ9.75m management buyout of Tristar Worldwide Chaffeur Services, with Barclays providing senior debt and invoicing discount facilities.
ROMANIA - Royalton acquires a 95% stake in CertAsig
Royalton Capital Investors II has acquired, directly and through a capital increase, a 95% stake in CertAsig, a Romanian insurance company, from a consortium of Spanish investors.
GERMANY – EquiVest acquires REGE Motorenteile
EquiVest, managed by CBR Management GmbH, has acquired REGE Motorenteile GmbH & Co KG from parent company Schaeffler AG. REGE manufactures parts for the automotive industry and is based in Herzogenaurach. The company has two manufacturing plants in Eisenach...
GERMANY - Hasso Plattner Ventures invests in family networking site
Hasso Plattner Ventures has provided OSN GmbH, the company behind family networking site verwandt.de, with a second round of funding. This marks the investor’s largest investment to date. Existing investor, Neuhaus Partners, also participated in this...
UK - Parallel Private Equity commits £70m to Greenhill fund
Parallel Private Equity has committed ТЃ70m to Greenhill & Co's first European fundraising effort. The money is structured as a ТЃ70m draw-down facility over five years. Greenhill announced the final close of the fund on ТЃ191m in December 2007.
UK - Advantage puts mortgage brokers on the block for £50m
Advantage Capital is to divest mortgage brokers portfolio company John Charcol for an estimated price of ТЃ50m. Gleacher Shacklock is to run a sale process to facilitate the disposal after Advantage received a number of approaches for the business.
UK - Electra Quoted Management acquires Peter Werth
Electra Quoted Management has led the ТЃ10m+ management buy-in of men's clothes brand Peter Werth. Clydesdale Bank provided a debt package to support the deal which represents an exit for founder Peter Werth.
UK - Blackstone edges closer to Close Brothers deal with £1.6bn offer
According to sources, Blackstone is prepared to pay up to 1,100p per share for Close Brothers. The offer represents a market capitalisation of ТЃ1.6bn for the London-listed investment bank.
UK/FRANCE - Platina announces EUR 75m close of fourth fund
Platina Finance Ltd has announced an intermediary close of its fourth fund, the European Renewable Energy Fund 1 LP (EREF), on EUR 75m. The fund was launched in October 2007 and is targeting a final close of EUR 250m by the end of 2008.
SPAIN - Nauta Capital backs tech player
Nauta Capital via its fund Nauta Tech Invest II has committed EUR 3m to technology company Scytl.
UK - Solon leads £1m Peakdale funding
Solon Ventures Ltd has led a ТЃ1m financing round for Peakdale Molecular Ltd, a specialist provider of chemistry services to the pharmaceutical industry.
BELGIUM - KBC Arkiv invests EUR 1m in Tailormade
KBC Arkiv has invested EUR 1m in Tailormade Logistics and Tailormade Transport, two Flemish companies specialising in integrated logistics services. This is a follow-on investment to the EUR 1m KBC Arkiv already invested in both companies in July 2006....
GERMANY - Creathor Venture provides seed financing to aka-aki
Creathor Venture Fund and a business angel have invested in aka-aki GmbH, which provides a social networking tool for mobile phones. Berlin-based aka-aki was founded in 2007 by eight founders who merge mobile internet and social networking in their product....
DENMARK - Segulah II sells Kosan Crisplant to United International Bank
Segulah II L.P has sold Kosan Crisplant Holding A/S, a provider of systems and solution for filing and reconditioning of Liquefied Petrolium Gas (LPG) cylinders, to Bahrain-based United International Bank B.S.C (UIB). The terms and conditions of the sale...
SPAIN - Clave Mayor invests EUR 1m in audio visual player
Clave Mayor has invested EUR 1m in Kronomav, a company specialising in robotic guidance for television and filming cameras.
UK - Terra Firma-backed EMI loses CEO
The chief executive and chairman of EMI, the record label acquired by Terra Firma in a ТЃ3.2bn take-private last year, has resigned. The news comes ahead of a restructuring plan for the group expected to be announced next week that will see hundreds of...
NETHERLANDS - Ludgate Environmental Fund invests EUR 791,968 in STX
Ludgate Environmental Fund has announced that it has made a further investment into Dutch environmental trading and broking company, STX Services.The first investment, as announced on 21st December 2007, was the purchase by LEF of 2,432 shares for EUR...
UK - Elderstreet achieves partial exit from IPO of Snacktime
Elderstreet Private Equity has achieved a partial exit on its investment in vending machine provider Snacktime Ltd following its IPO on AIM. The company placed just over 2 million shares at 144p a share, raising approximately ТЃ3m and representing a market...
UK - KCP hires new investment manager
Key Capital Partners has appointed Chris Sheasby as investment manager in its Cambridge Office.
UK - Inflexion strengthens investment team with two appointments
Inflexion Private Equity has strengthened its investment team with the appointments of Gareth Healy as investment director in the London office and Malcolm Coffin as investment executive in the Manchester office.
SWEDEN - Litorina Kapital creates Scandinavian IT security group
Litorina Kapital III has created a new IT security group through its acquisition of three companies: Coromatic, Metric Power and Scanpocon, for an undisclosed sum.
CEE - Aurora Russia invests £16.1m for a 24.3% stake in SuperStroy
Last December Aurora Russia Ltd announced an investment of £16.1m in cash for a 24.3% stake in Grindelia Holdings Ltd which owns 99.5% of Russian retail chain SuperStroy. Aurora Russia's investment will take the form of new equity and will be used to...
CEE - Consortium led by Columbia Capital to take over GTS Central Europe
A consortium of funds led by Columbia Capital, M/C Venture Partners and Innova Capital is set to take over Central Europe’s telecoms service provider, GTS Central Europe. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2008.
FRANCE – I-Source Gestion and GIMV lead EUR 7.3m investment in Movea
I-Source Gestion and GIMV have co-led a EUR 7.3m funding round for start-up Movea both pledging EUR 3m each. Also investing is Thomson a subsidiary of the French research institute CEA. The deal represents the first round of financing for the company....