Category Archives: News

Gaw Capital Partners and Beyond Ventures Announce Equity Investment in Series A Round Financing for Candao.com

Gaw Capital

April 18, 2019, Shanghai – Real estate private equity firm Gaw Capital Partners, through the private equity fund of its operation company, together with Hong Kong-based venture capital fund Beyond Ventures, today announced an equity investment in the Series A round fund-raising totalling RMB100 million (US$14.9 million) for Candao.com, a Chinese start-up specialising in food delivery management service. Chinese mobile internet-focused investment fund MFund also participated in this round of fund-raising.
Founded in April 2014, Candao.com is managed by Guangzhou Candao Information Technology Co Ltd. The company provides one-stop solutions for Chinese medium and large-sized chain restaurants, including SaaS delivery management systems, distribution systems, and business data analysis centers.
As of March 2019, Guangzhou–based Candao.com has served over 200 medium and large-sized chain restaurant brands, including Haagen-Dazs, Burger King, Papa Johns and Costa. The company currently provides services to nearly 30,000 offline restaurants across more than 300 cities in China, with over RMB1.4 billion (US$209 million) in monthly gross merchandise volume.
Proceeds of this fund-raising will be used to strengthen the research and development of the company’s systems and explore applications of technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI).
Humbert Pang, Managing Principal and Head of China for Gaw Capital Partners, said, “Gaw Capital continues to embrace and support the technology platforms that will enhance the operational efficiency, especially those operators related to real estate sector. The food delivery sector is booming in China and has become part of most people’s daily life. However, many F&B operators are still lagging behind on the resources to deal with the new technology ecosystem, which makes Candao an ideal easy one-stop platform for them.”
Beyond Ventures was founded in 2017 by Hony Capital, Hong Kong-based venture capital fund e-Garden Ventures in partnership with locally-grown serial entrepreneurs. It has invested a total of RMB240 million (US$35.88 million) in 13 companies including Chinese AI unicorn SenseTime, DNA Testing company Prenetics, CMOS chip maker SmartSens Tech, Hong Kong taxi-hailing app HKTaxi, and Hong Kong Online to Offline e-commerce platform YOHO.
Gaw Capital has over 13 years of experience investing in and/or turning around commercial properties in Greater China, including Hong Kong. The firm successfully transformed and repositioned properties such as 133 Wai Yip Street in Hong Kong, a former 12-storey industrial building turned creative office space; and Sky Bridge HQ, a mixed-use project located in the heart of Linkong Economic Park in Shanghai. In recent years, the firm also purchased 29 local Hong Kong shopping malls from Link REIT, which it intends to reposition and revitalize into attractive hubs of community life.
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About Gaw Capital Partners
Gaw Capital Partners is a uniquely positioned private equity fund management company that focusing on real estate markets in greater China and other high barrier-to-entry markets globally.
Specializing in adding strategic value to under-utilized real estate through redesign and repositioning, Gaw Capital runs an integrated business model with own in-house asset management operating platforms in retail, hospitality, property development and logistics. The firm’s investments span the entire spectrum of real estate sectors, including residential development, offices, retail malls, hospitality and logistics warehouses.
Gaw Capital has raised five commingled funds targeting the Greater China and APAC regions since 2005. The firm also manages value-add/opportunistic funds in Vietnam and the US, a Pan-Asia hospitality fund, a European hospitality fund and also provides services for separate account direct investments globally.
Gaw Capital has raised equity of USD$ 11.4 billion since 2005 and commands assets of USD$ 18.2 billion under management as of Q4 2018.
Contacts:
Gaw Capital Partners
Camille Lam
Tel: +852 2583 7717/+852 9884 9198
Email: camillelam@gawcapital.com
www.gawcapital.com
Citigate Dewe Rogerson
Ryan Mellor
Tel: +852 3103 0130/+852 5315 2737
Email: ryan.mellor@citigatedewerogerson.com

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Carlyle Cardinal Ireland (CCI) Sells Payzone to AIB and First Data for €100m

Carlyle

New owners to build on growth achieved under CCI

Ireland – Carlyle Cardinal Ireland has announced that Payzone, one of Ireland’s largest providers of payment solutions, is to be acquired by a newly-formed joint venture established by AIB Group plc (AIB) and First Data Corporation. The joint venture will acquire a majority stake in Payzone from existing shareholders, including Carlyle Cardinal Ireland Fund (CCI), for an enterprise value of up to €100 million.

CCI, the private equity fund established by The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG) and Cardinal Capital Group, acquired a majority shareholding in Payzone in March 2015 and the company has grown strongly during the four years of CCI ownership. CCI worked closely with the management team to diversify the business and develop the company into a multichannel payments provider, employing 90 people. 

Today Payzone’s technology solutions allow both large and small Irish businesses to accept payments in store, on the road, over the phone, and through a website or app. The company processes 125 million transactions annually for 100+ client companies and operates Ireland’s largest retail payments network with 11,500+ points of sale throughout the country.

The change in ownership will have no impact on the day-to-day business operations of Payzone in Ireland. The senior management team, including Jim Deignan, CEO and Nigel Bell, CFO, will remain in their roles. 

Jim Deignan, Chief Executive, Payzone Ireland, said: “This development is a positive step for Payzone and a vote of confidence in the future of the business. We see significant opportunity to grow our footprint in the fintech sector and this can only be enhanced further with the backing and support of our new shareholders, who bring deep industry expertise to make things happen. The team at Carlyle Cardinal Ireland, which originally invested in Payzone in 2015, has worked very successfully with us to help develop the business and to support our continued growth. We thank them for their great support and investment over that period.”

Peter Garvey, Managing Director, The Carlyle Group, said: “Working with the fantastic management team at Payzone, CCI’s investment in innovation and new product development has helped to accelerate the growth of the business and to transform it into one of Ireland’s most successful multi-channel payment solutions platforms. Net revenue and EBITDA have grown by 40% and 70% respectively, since we invested. Payzone still has numerous opportunities for further growth, which can now be realised with the support of the new investors. This is the fund’s third exit and once again demonstrates the benefits of active, growth-focused private equity investment for ambitious Irish businesses.”

Daragh Lane, Cardinal Capital Group said: “At CCI we believe in helping management teams grow the companies we invest in. When CCI acquired a majority shareholding in Payzone four years ago it processed 61 million transactions a year, delivering a gross transaction value of €1 billion to its customers. Today it processes 125 million transactions a year delivering in excess of €2 billion of value to its customers and is a well-established Irish fintech organisation that drives significant innovations across many traditionally cash-based markets.”

CCI representatives Peter Garvey and Robert Easton of The Carlyle Group and Daragh Lane of Cardinal Capital Group will step down from the Payzone Board on completion of the transaction, which is subject to approval from the European and Irish competition authorities.

* * * * *

Press Contacts:

Cardinal Capital Group
Tom McEnaney, McEnaney Media
Tel: +353 87 2222 666 tom@tommcenaney.com

The Carlyle Group
Laurie Mannix, MKC Communications
Tel. +353 1 703 8620 Mob: 086 814 3710 laurie@mkc.ie

Payzone
Frans van Cauwelaert, WHPR
Tel: +353 87 947 6743 frans.vancauwelaert@ogilvy.com

About Payzone

In Ireland, Payzone is the largest consumer payments network in the country with over 7,500 retail agents which process a variety of electronic transaction services, including mobile phone top ups, debit/credit card transactions; M50 motorway toll payments; Leap travel cards, local property tax payments, parking fees, schools and clubs payment platform, pre-paid utility and parcel collection services.

The company employs over 90 people based in its Sandyford head office in Dublin.

Payzone’s focus is on delivering leading edge payment services that drive greater efficiency for clients and increased revenues for its retail partners.

As industry leader, Payzone’s technology credentials, capabilities and expertise are a particular strength of the business.    

Visit www.payzone.ie

About Carlyle Cardinal Ireland

Carlyle Cardinal Ireland is a joint venture between The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG) and Cardinal Capital Group.  The €292 million private equity fund is focused on growth capital and buyout investment opportunities across the island of Ireland.

About Cardinal Capital Group

Cardinal Capital Group is Ireland’s leading provider of alternative capital, directing private-equity capital, mezzanine finance and alternative lending to a broad range of sectors in the Irish market.  Cardinal invests its own capital alongside institutional funders to support entrepreneurs and corporate management teams as well as real-estate investors and developers.

Web: www.cardinalcapitalgroup.com

About The Carlyle Group

The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG) is a global investment firm with $216 billion of assets under management across 343 investment vehicles as of December 31, 2018.  Carlyle’s purpose is to invest wisely and create value on behalf of its investors, many of whom are public pensions.  Carlyle invests across four segments – Corporate Private Equity, Real Assets, Global Credit and Investment Solutions – in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, the Middle East, North America and South America.  Carlyle has expertise in various industries, including: aerospace, defense & government services, consumer & retail, energy, financial services, healthcare, industrial, real estate, technology & business services, telecommunications & media and transportation.  The Carlyle Group employs more than 1,650 people in 31 offices across six continents

Web: www.carlyle.com
Videos: www.youtube.com/onecarlyle
Tweets: www.twitter.com/onecarlyle
Podcasts: www.carlyle.com/about-carlyle/market- commentary

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Imandra completes $5 million seed round led by AlbionVC, IQ Capital and Liveoak Venture Partners

IQ Capital

Imandra Inc. – creator of the Imandra cloud-native automated reasoning engine – has completed a $5 million Seed investment led by AlbionVC, IQ Capital and LiveOak Venture Partners. The capital will be used towards further growth in financial services and fast-growing applications of their AI technology to autonomous vehicles, robotics and machine learning. Imandra democratises deep advances in symbolic AI for making algorithms safe, explainable and fair. Imandra’s “Reasoning as a Service ®” platform makes these techniques widely accessible to those without specialised background in these fields.

 

Since its founding in 2014, Imandra has pioneered advances in AI for algorithm safety and compliance and their application to new industries. In 2015 it won the UBS Future of Finance Challenge, coming in 1st place out of more than 600 companies from 52 countries by using its AI technology to find a fundamental flaw in the design of the UBS dark pool previously undetected by the bank and the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Imandra’s current clients include top global investment banks who rely on Imandra for design, testing and ongoing audits of their complex trading systems.

 

Since the public release of Imandra’s cloud services last year, the company has expanded into robotics, autonomous vehicles and reinforcement learning. Grant Passmore, co-founder and co-CEO, said “As our reliance on complex software grows, deep advances in AI are required to ensure the algorithms we depend on are safe, explainable and fair. We’re proud of our team and the advances we’ve made in turning groundbreaking research into a scalable product with wide-reaching positive impact. This investment is a strong recognition of our progress and we’re delighted for the support of our venture partners in our next phase of growth.”

 

Denis Ignatovich, co-founder and co-CEO, noted “The need for automated mathematical techniques for algorithm analysis has never been more pressing. Industry leaders including Facebook, Amazon and Google are recognising this with significant investments into automated symbolic reasoning for their business use cases. We could not be in a better position at a better time to provide a scalable and industry-agnostic platform. We’re excited to partner with Albion, IQ Capital and LiveOak on this journey and look forward to leveraging their expertise as we scale our company in this next stage.”

 

This latest round of seed funding will support Imandra’s expansion in both the US and the UK, with significant hiring of AI, engineering and product talent in Austin, London and Edinburgh.

Ed Stacey, Partner at IQ Capital, said: “The founders of Imandra – Grant and Denis – have taken their cutting edge research into characterising algorithmic behaviour and applied it in making a scalable product for the finance industry. We also believe this technology has great potential for a broad class of algorithmic and AI challenges. The founders have a proven track record both in academia – at leading institutions including the University of Cambridge and University of Edinburgh – as well as in business. Many of the companies IQ Capital invests in are IP-rich and spin out of university networks – Imandra is a great example of the type of businesses we want to invest in.”

Robert Whitby-Smith, Partner at Albion VC, said: “Increasing automation safely is critical to most sectors including automotive, aerospace, defence, healthcare, financial services and social media. The number and complexity of algorithms used in applications regarded as safety critical is increasing rapidly with the expansion of automation and machine learning and it is increasingly challenging to test software robustly at scale, and ensure the exhaustive creation of edge cases, using traditional techniques. Imandra’s proprietary software which provides automated testing for functional languages and model-based generation of tests will become a key element of the future mix of software testing. The completeness of the learning experience provided by Imandra will provide significant benefits beyond software testing including the evolution of the training of artificial neural networks. We are delighted to support Denis and Grant achieve their exciting vision.”

Krishna Srinivasan, Founding Partner at LiveOak Venture Partners, said: “Our investment in Imandra embodies the core of our investment thesis to back Texas based top notch entrepreneurs that are disrupting large industry categories.  We recognized quickly that Denis, Grant and team are amongst the best in the world at this emerging area of algorithm and application security testing and that their approach has the ability for multi-industry transformational impact. We are also super excited to welcome Denis and Grant back to their Texas roots, leverage the tremendous local computer science talent and build something significant from where it all began.”

 

Denis Ignatovich and Grant Passmore, the founders of Imandra, have backgrounds in academic mathematics and financial trading. They founded the company in London in 2014, a decade after having met as undergraduate roommates at the University of Texas. Denis started his career at Deutsche Bank in New York, before moving to London to lead a trading desk that relied heavily on complex algorithms. Grant earned his PhD in AI for algorithm safety at the University of Edinburgh and is a Life Member of Clare Hall, University of Cambridge. In 2019, the company opened its new US headquarters in Austin, TX.

 

About Imandra

Imandra is an automated reasoning company with offices in Austin, London and Edinburgh. Imandra was founded by former UT Austin roommates, Denis Ignatovich and Dr. Grant Passmore, who first saw the need and opportunity to apply deep advances in AI to the design and regulation of complex algorithms in finance. The company has since released Imandra, an industry-agnostic cloud-native automated reasoning engine which brings its “AI for algorithms” technology to mainstream software development at scale.

 

About IQ Capital

IQ Capital is a Cambridge-based venture capital firm that invests in UK ‘deep-tech’ across sectors including machine learning, AI, engineering and materials, and data-focused propositions based on disruptive algorithms. All of the firm’s portfolio companies are capable of dominating their respective markets on a global scale. The team typically invest at seed and series A stage, with significant capital reserved to scale companies through their growth stages. Initial investments range from £300k to £5m, with capacity for follow on investment up to £10m.

 

The IQ Capital team has achieved over 20 exits to date, to companies including Oracle, Google, Apple, Huawei and Facebook and several IPOs. IQ Capital has led 28 investments over the last three years. In 2018, IQ Capital has invested in Apperio, Audio Analytics, Paragraf, and Myrtle – joining other portfolio including Speechmatics, Privitar, Thought Machine, Audio Analytic, Oxford Space Systems, Fluidic Analytics, Divido, Senseye and Spectral Edge. The team are currently investing from their third £125 million fund (IQCF III).

 

IQ Capital won Seed Fund of the Year at the GP Bullhound Investor Allstars 2018.

About AlbionVC

AlbionVC is the technology investment arm of Albion Capital Group LLP. The technology team invests from seed through to Series B in high growth companies, predominantly in the UK, with a particular focus on B2B software and technology enabled services. Albion has 20+ years’ experience investing in technology, has c.£450m FUM in technology companies and over 40 tech investments within its portfolios. Visit: www.albion.vc

 

About LiveOak Venture Partners

LiveOak Venture Partners is a venture capital fund based in Austin, Texas, founded by Ben Scott, Krishna Srinivasan and Venu Shamapant. With 20 years of successful venture investing in Texas, the founders of LiveOak have helped create nearly $2 billion of enterprise value. While almost all of LiveOak’s investments begin in the early stages, LiveOak is a full life cycle investor focused on technology and technology-enabled service companies based in Texas. LiveOak Venture Partners is a lead investor in exciting high-growth Texas-based companies such as CS Disco, Digital Pharmacist, NSS Labs, OJO Labs and Opcity. Visit: www.liveoakvp.com

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Data is the new gold: Announcing our investment in Adverity!

Felix Capital

Everyone universally agrees that data is the new gold. Virtually every single company we come across wants to become more data-driven, as they recognise that data is key to unlocking more customer value and becoming more efficient and effective. This is especially true for marketers, who are dealing with large amounts of data and increasing complexity of the marketing stack. We have spent a long time at Felix trying to understand technologies that are being created to help marketers handle this complexity, and today we are so pleased to announce that we have led a €11 million series B round of funding in Adverity, Vienna-based marketing data intelligence platform. We are also extremely excited to be joined on this journey by existing investors in Adverity, Mangrove, Speedinvest, 42 Capital and AWS Grunderfonds, and new investors, SAP.io and Sapphire Ventures.

Adverity displays so many characteristics of what we love at Felix!

Mission-driven founders with big ideas and global ambitions

At Felix we are extremely founder-driven, aiming to back mission-led founders with big ideas and global ambitions. Adverity was founded by exactly these kinds of founders. When Alex, Martin and Andreas founded Adverity in 2015, they recognised companies’ increasing desire to be data driven, while being confronted with an ever-growing number of channels through which to collect customer data. They experienced many of these pain points themselves, and they set out to create a technology that would help companies tackle this data complexity and revolutionise data-driven marketing.

Andreas, Martin and Alex: on a mission to change the way marketers collect and use data!

Laser focus on product as key to winning customers

As tech investors we know that product is everything, and having a strong focus on product excellence is what differentiates winning companies. Adverity’s laser focus on product was palpable when we had our first product demo and we continued building greater conviction on product especially after talking to many enthusiastic customers!

Adverity has developed two main products, DataTap, which automates the integration of data, and Insight, which also harmonises and integrates data, presenting it via easy-to-interpret dashboards and interfaces. Much of the hard work of data analysis that marketing professionals previously struggled to master is now automated and easy. Marketers can see data from different platforms alongside each other in a glance. Brands benefit from greater flexibility, aided in no small part by a general shift to faster, more efficient cloud systems. Put simply, Adverity is making data analysis more nimble, reliable, responsive and productive.

Building a global business from Austria

We’ve been so impressed by the team’s execution, doing a lot with little. The business has grown from its home base in Austria, opening an office in the UK in 2018 and winning global customers, including in the US, where they plan to open an office in the near future. Adverity now boasts dozens of customers across the world, including IKEA, Runtastic, Essity, Reprise Media, OMD, Mindshare and Omnicom. The company has grown rapidly and more than doubled revenues in 2018, adding loyal customers at a rapid pace. This growth has been achieved extremely capital efficiently, with “magic numbers” that are truly magical!

Operating in a market with strong growth trends

The market Adverity operates in is set to continue growing quickly. More marketers are relying on marketing technology, with CMOs now devoting 29% of their budget to martech, according to the latest Gartner CMO Spend Survey, up from 22% the year before. This creates a tremendous opportunity for Adverity to help more customers to manage data complexity and truly understand their marketing investment. No wonder that two of the most important themes for us at Felix are “power of data” and “tech-enablement of CMO” — we are very passionate about these two themes!

Since many of the companies in Felix Capital’s portfolio are consumer-facing, relying on data to understand and serve their customers, the synergy with Adverity was clear to us from the beginning. We are also huge believers in technology’s ability to help companies build better consumer propositions in general, and this has been the thesis behind many of our B2B investments such as Olapic, Mirakl, Yoobic and Unmade. We are also excited to back an Austrian business, our first investment in the country, and look forward to supporting the team’s continued success in the years to come!

Sasha and the Felix team

 

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TPG Real Estate Partners and Contera Form a Strategic Venture

TPG Capital

Partnership  brings together complementary capabilities to pursue industrial real estate  investment opportunities and development projects in Central Europe

San  Francisco, London, and Prague – April 17, 2019 – TPG Real  Estate Partners (“TREP”), the dedicated real estate equity investment platform  of global alternative asset firm TPG, and Contera, an established developer and  operator of industrial parks in the Czech Republic, announced today they have formed  a strategic venture (the “Venture”). The Venture will seek to acquire and  develop industrial projects in Central Europe, primarily in the Czech Republic  and Slovakia. One of the Venture’s first projects is a 140,000 sqm industrial  zone directly adjacent to the D1 highway in Ostrava-Hrušov.

In connection with the formation of the Venture, TREP has acquired  certain assets from Contera, including the company’s industrial parks in  Teplice and Ostrava, in a transaction valued at more than 90 million EUR.  Contera will continue to operate and manage these assets, as well as the assets  acquired and developed through the Venture. Contera will also continue to  independently own and manage the remainder of its portfolio, which includes approximately  110,000 sqm of industrial property.

“In forming the Venture, we are partnering with a highly experienced  and proven local team to pursue opportunities in a region and sector that  continue to experience strong growth trends,” said Michiel Celis of TREP. “We  look forward to making this a successful, long-term partnership and hope to invest  significantly more capital as we source new projects and execute on an exciting  pipeline of opportunities.”

“After 10 years of growing  Contera independently, thanks to this partnership with a strong global  investor, we can start a new era in the development of our company,” said Tomáš  Jirků, Co-Founder and CEO of  Contera. Dušan Kastl, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Contera, added, “Our  partnership with TREP will allow us to expand significantly and reach strategic  scale in the Czech and Slovak markets.”

TREP has a history of developing strategic partnerships with  high-quality management teams and operators to capitalize on compelling market  opportunities. Select current and past investments include A&O Hotels and  Hostels, Arlington Business Parks, Evergreen Industrial Properties, Icon  Industrial, P3 Logistic Parks, and TriGranit.

Founded in 2009, Contera develops, owns, and operates industrial  business parks in prime locations in the Czech Republic. Contera’s full-service  business model provides clients with leasing options within its portfolio, as  well as customized, build-to-suit solutions. The company also specializes in  the redevelopment and revitalization of brownfield properties in well-connected  locations. This year, Contera celebrates its 10th anniversary.

Cushman & Wakefield served as an advisor to Contera for this  transaction.

About TPG  Real Estate
TPG Real Estate (“TPGRE”) is the real estate platform of  TPG, a leading global alternative asset firm with more than $104 billion of  assets under management and 17 offices around the world. TPGRE includes TPG  Real Estate Partners (“TREP”), its equity investment platform, and TPG Real Estate  Finance Trust (NYSE: “TRTX”), its debt origination and acquisition platform.  TREP focuses primarily on investments in real estate-rich companies, property  portfolios, and select single assets located in North America and Europe. TRTX  originates and acquires senior real estate loans across a broad spectrum of  asset classes in North America. TPGRE currently manages approximately $10.8  billion in assets across both platforms. For more information please visit www.tpg.com.

About  Contera
Founded in 2009 by experienced professionals in the field of  property development, project and construction management, Contera owns and  operates industrial parks in major locations in the Czech Republic. Most  buildings in these parks have been completed and leased to leading Czech and  international companies, mainly in the logistics and manufacturing sectors. For  more information www.contera.cz

Media Contacts
Contera
Erika Straškrabová
+420 732 915 226
erika.straskrabova@contera.cz

TPG
US
Luke Barrett
415-743-1550
media@tpg.com

Europe
Alex Jones
+44 207 952 2000
tpg@greenbrookpr.com

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TPG-Led Consortium Invests in APM Monaco

TPG Capital

HONG  KONG and BEIJING—17 April 2019 — TPG, a leading global alternative asset firm,  today announced that it has led a consortium of investors and reached a  definitive agreement to invest in APM Monaco (“APM” or “The Company”), a  leading contemporary jewellery brand, synonymous with the  chic of Monaco and South of France lifestyle. The brand originated in Monaco  and successfully grew a global footprint with a significant presence in Asia.  TPG and its partners will together acquire 30% of the company from its existing  shareholders. TPG is investing in APM through TPG Capital Asia, the firm’s  Asia-focused private equity platform. China Synergy is an investment platform  jointly set-up by TPG and CICC Capital, and Trail is a Paris-based European  private equity investment firm. The transaction is expected to close in a few  months. Additional terms were not disclosed.

“APM  Monaco’s team is proud and look forward to writing a new chapter of our brand  history. TPG Consortium is the ideal leading global partner to continue to  develop our contemporary luxury vision,” said Philippe Prette, founder and CEO  of APM. “TPG’s unique expertise in growing iconic brands and their belief in  our innovative products and business model makes them an excellent partner to  work with, and at the same time, China Synergy and Trail bring their respective  strengths in China and Europe. We look forward to the opportunities that lie  ahead of us as we expand domestically and globally optimizing our strengths  with their expertise while keeping the strong identity and values of the brand”.

APM started  as an original design manufacturer (ODM) for leading European distributors 37 years  ago. The Company relocated productions to China in 1992 and launched its own  jewelry brand APM Monaco 20 years later. Headquartered in Hong Kong, APM  combines contemporary luxury with fast retailing, two best-performing  categories, capitalizing on strong demand from an upcoming generation and  increasing lifestyle spending in China. With its in-house design experts, APM  is a pioneer in the fashion jewelry space with strong product innovation. By  the end of 2018, APM had approximately 200 stores in 26 countries.

“The  founders and management team of APM have successfully built a fashionable brand  that resonates well with consumers and has a loyal following. We are impressed  by the Company’s creativity, vision for the luxury industry, and values,” said  Chang Sun, Managing Partner, TPG China. “As investors, we are excited by the  opportunity to partner with dynamic entrepreneurs like Philippe to bring their  vision to the next level and look forward to working with the Company’s  management team to accelerate growth by leveraging our global resources. We are  also very happy to partner with China Synergy and Trail to accomplish this  deal.”

“This  is a perfect demonstration of the power of partnership,” said Ding Wei, CEO of  CICC Capital, “TPG, China Synergy, and Trail each contributes distinctive  competitive advantages and collectively bring irreplaceable value to the Company.”

“APM  Monaco’s transformation from a European company into an Asian-focused market  leader has been highly successful”, said Xavier Marin, Managing Partner of Trail.  “As the European member of the consortium, we are thrilled to partner with  Philippe and the whole management team to bring APM Monaco into the premier  global jewelry brand position.”

2019  marks TPG’s 25th year investing in Asia, since establishing its first  regionally-dedicated fund in 1994. Comprised of approximately 50 investment  professionals, the TPG Asia team pursues investments in a broad range of  industries, with a significant focus on consumer, financial services,  healthcare, and TMT/new economy.  Across  platforms, TPG has significant experience partnering with strong consumer  brands to build and scale their businesses. Select current and past investments  include Anastasia Beverly Hills, Cirque du Soleil, Ducati, Lenskart, Rodan +  Fields, and Viking Cruises, etc.

Natixis  acted as the exclusive financial advisor to APM Monaco on this transaction. LPA-CGR  and Paul Weiss acted as joint counsel of APM Monaco. Cleary Gottlieb Steen  & Hamilton acted as the legal advisor for the Consortium.

About TPG

TPG  is a leading global alternative asset firm founded in 1992 with more than $104  billion of assets under management and offices in Austin, Beijing, Boston,  Dallas, Fort Worth, Hong Kong, Houston, London, Luxembourg, Melbourne, Moscow,  Mumbai, New York, San Francisco, Seoul, and Singapore. TPG’s investment  platforms are across a wide range of asset classes, including private equity,  growth equity, real estate, credit, and public equity. TPG aims to build  dynamic products and options for its investors while also instituting  discipline and operational excellence across the investment strategy and  performance of its portfolio. For more information, visit www.tpg.com.

About China Synergy

China  Synergy is an investment platform set-up jointly by TPG, the leading global  alternative asset firm, and CICC Capital. This platform targets investment  opportunities both in China and overseas that will benefit from the key trends  in the Chinese economy, underpinned by the sponsors’ strong cross-border  investment and business development capabilities.

CICC  Capital, a wholly owned subsidiary of China International Capital Corporation,  has become a leading private equity brand in China, and a significant player to  promote the transformation of Chinese economy.

About Trail

Trail is an independent European private equity investment  firm with over €750 million cumulated capital managed to date. With its two  strategic partners, Silk Road Fund and CICC, China’s preeminent investment  bank, Trail has set-up a first-of-its-kind investment platform across Europe  and Asia. Trail’s team helps high performing small and mid-size European  companies scaling up in size, scope and geographical boundaries with a specific  focus on China.  Trail is committed to  long-term, responsible and value-creating investment. It has three offices in  Paris, Luxembourg and Beijing.

 

Media Contacts

For TPG
Tracy Hu
thu@tpg.com

For CICC
Sherry Tan
tans@cicc.com.cn

For Trail
Christelle Alamichel
calamichel@gmail.com

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Super Raises $20M Series B Round Funding to Reinvent Home Ownership Experience

Aquiline

SAN FRANCISCO, April 17, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — Super, a subscription service that provides care and repair for your home, announced it has completed a $20 million Series B round of funding led by Aquiline Technology Growth (ATG), an early- and growth-stage fund managed by Aquiline Capital Partners. The round included participation from Munich Re Ventures, Liberty Mutual Strategic Ventures, Moderne Ventures, 8VC, QIA and Solon Mack Capital.

Founded in 2015 by CEO Jorey Ramer, the company has raised a total of $30 million in funding to-date. Munich Re Ventures, the venture capital arm of Munich Re, one of the largest global reinsurers, continues its participation since leading the company’s Series A round from its HSB Fund. With a presence in key U.S. markets including Austin, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, San Antonio and Washington, DC metro, Super plans to use the investment to add new geographies based on the demand from the market, as well as for hiring and technology development.

“Super has developed an effective, convenient platform to provide premium care and repair services for homeowners,” said Max Chee of ATG. “Super is tackling an industry that is ripe for innovation with a smart, technology-forward approach, and we are excited to work with Jorey and the rest of the team at Super to help continue that exciting trajectory.”

According to a recent Bankrate survey, nearly half of homeowners have regrets over their home purchase, and the number one reason cited is unexpected maintenance or hidden costs. Super is tackling this head on by remedying the ineffectiveness of current home warranties with a technology-driven and customer-centric approach that makes it as easy to rent as it is to own.

Homeowners can use Super’s custom app to get appliances fixed and order concierge services to manage the logistics of many home service needs without ever having to deal with the stress, hassle and costs involved. Additionally, Super helps prevent problems with an in-depth maintenance schedule and provides the option to have Super handle routine home maintenance.

“After purchasing my first home, it struck me that homeownership itself is a lot more stressful due to the lack of insight and visibility into unforeseen home-related expenses,” said Jorey Ramer, CEO and Founder, Super. “Our vision is to help homeowners own like a renter, by insuring more of the risks associated with owning a home.”

 

About Super

Super is a San Francisco-based technology company that offers subscription services providing care and repair for your home. Backed by leading investors, Super was founded in 2015 by Jorey Ramer, Bill Davis, and Ryan Donnelly. Super is committed to providing premium service quality for all homeowners. We partner with the best local servicers to deliver quick and effective home repair and maintenance at a predictable cost, using technology to take the hassle out of homeownership. Visit us at www.hellosuper.com for more information.

About Aquiline Technology Growth

Aquiline Technology Growth (ATG) seeks to invest in early- and growth-stage technology companies that are bringing innovation to the financial services ecosystems. ATG is managed by Aquiline Capital Partners, a private equity firm based in New York and London investing in businesses globally across the financial services and technology sector. The ATG team has experience in technology and financial services and is supported by its colleagues at Aquiline, strategic partners, and an active group of industry Executive Advisors. For more information on ATG, visit www.atgvc.com.

Categories: News

Olcott Plastics Joins Forces with Pretium Packaging

Chesterfield, MO, April 16, 2019—Pretium Packaging, a leading North American manufacturer of plastic containers and closures, is pleased to announce that it has joined forces with Olcott Plastics, Inc. of St. Charles, Illinois, through an acquisition. Olcott meaningfully bolsters Pretium’s injection molding and personal care/beauty offerings while Pretium allows Olcott to offer blow molded containers and a national footprint to its customers.

For the past 50 years, Olcott has created a strong brand as a leading supplier of primary packaging to premier beauty and healthcare companies. It specializes in injection molding and decorating of single and double wall polypropylene (PP) jars, “seamless” PET jars as well as injection molding and lining of PP closures. Many of its original customers from 1969 who were serviced from the back of the family station wagon still buy from the company today.

In keeping with Pretium’s ongoing acquisition philosophy, existing employees and management of Olcott will be retained.

“We are pleased to welcome co-owners Joseph M. Brodner and John Brodner, and the Olcott employees, to the Pretium organization. The acquisition brings significant beauty care packaging expertise and a robust product line to the Pretium portfolio, which nicely complement the health and beauty care packaging offerings already in our portfolio. We are proud to add Olcott to our family of brands,” said Paul Kayser, president and chief executive officer of Pretium.

“Joining forces with Pretium is a perfect fit for the next chapter of Olcott Plastics. We are excited to be able to offer our customers a broader product portfolio and national footprint while continuing to provide the same level of service they are accustomed to receiving from Olcott. We believe this transaction will be beneficial to both our customers and employees,” said Joseph and John Brodner.

David Golde, managing director at Genstar Capital, stated, “Genstar is excited to be sponsoring Pretium’s acquisition of Olcott, which is the sixth acquisition completed during Genstar’s ownership. Olcott brings to Pretium significant expertise and market presence in injection molding and personal care packaging, both of which represent key areas of continued investment and growth for Pretium.”

P&M Corporate Finance (PMCF) served as Olcott’s financial advisor in the transaction.

About Pretium

Pretium Packaging (www.pretiumpkg.com) is a leading North American manufacturer of plastic containers and closures for the food, specialty beverage, household and industrial cleaner, sports nutrition and health, and beauty product industries. Pretium manufactures approximately two billion PET and HDPE containers annually from its 17 locations across the United States and Canada for more than 700 customers.

About Olcott Plastics

Olcott Plastics was founded in 1969 and grew under the direction of Joseph F. Brodner Jr. until the late 1980′s when he was joined by his sons Joseph M. Brodner and John Brodner. Over the past 50 years, the company has become an injection molding, mold building, printing and cap lining powerhouse, producing more than a million plastic jars and closure combinations a day.

About Genstar Capital

Genstar Capital (www.gencap.com) is a leading private equity firm that has been actively investing in high quality companies for over 30 years. Based in San Francisco, Genstar works in partnership with its management teams and its network of strategic advisors to transform its portfolio companies into industry-leading businesses. Genstar currently has approximately $17 billion of assets under management and targets investments focused on targeted segments of the industrial technology, healthcare, software, and financial services industries.

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MEDIA INQUIRIES:

Chris Tofalli
Chris Tofalli Public Relations
914-834-4334

 

Categories: News

Ports Group acquires ABE Partners

Priveq

Ports Group, a market-leading total supplier of technology and services for management, monitoring and protection of brands and digital assets, has signed an agreement to acquire all shares in ABE Partners.

The acquisition is a part of Ports Group’s growth strategy and fortifies the company’s position in southern Sweden.

ABE Partners is a company operating in the same business area as Ports Group and offer their clients valuable domain name and trademark solutions.

Please find the full press release below (only in Swedish).

PDF

For further information, please contact

Louise Nilsson medarbetare

Louise Nilsson

Partner & CEO
Phone: +46 8 459 67 63
Mobile: +46 70 950 95 50

Categories: News

Industrifonden welcomes digital health pioneer NuvoAir to the family

Industriefonden

We’re happy to welcome NuvoAir to the Life Science portfolio, as the company announces its latest financing round of $3 Million to improve lung health worldwide. 

NuvoAir aims to make respiratory diseases measurable and more treatable. Established in 2015, NuvoAir launched the first world’s first smartphone spirometer, making real time lung function assessment possible at home. In three years, NuvoAir has collected over 500,000 spirometry tests that today are powering its machine learning algorithms to provide insights to patients, their physicians and pharma companies.

NuvoAir’s software and hardware is CE marked and the company continues to expand its commercial presence in Europe, America and Asia. NuvoAir has established important partnerships with global leading hospitals, insurance companies, CROs and and pharma companies, including Novartis.

In addition to supporting better self-management and improving clinical decisions, NuvoAir is also active in helping researchers around the world advancing their effort in the respiratory field. NuvoAir Alfa software is designed to allow the roll-out of real-world-evidence studies on a large scale.

Categories: News