Ratos is carrying out changes in its management group, meaning that it will now consist of:

Jonas Wiström, CEO
Helene Gustafsson, Head of IR and Press
Henrik Lundh, Vice President (new member since January 2019)
Anders Slettengren, Vice President
Magnus Stephensen, General Counsel
Peter Wallin, CFO (new member since December 2018)

Robin Molvin, Vice President and previous member of the management group, and Johan Rydmark, Director, are leaving Ratos. Meanwhile, Henrik Lundh has been appointed as Vice President and member of the management group.

“I look forward to welcoming Henrik Lundh as a member of Ratos’s management group, where I’m sure that his experience and knowledge will be of immense benefit in the future.

I want to extend a sincere thanks to Robin Molvin, whose important work with several of our portfolio companies throughout his many years here at Ratos has created significant value. Over the years, Robin has strengthened and assumed responsibility for Ratos’s presence in Denmark, which was the driving factor behind the acquisition of airteam and Oase Outdoors. At airteam, Robin has led the company’s growth journey and expansion into Sweden through strategic bolt-on acquisitions. I also want to thank Johan Rydmark, whose previous investment responsibilities at the portfolio companies Nebula and Serena, and previous operational development of portfolio companies such as Stofa, have created important value for Ratos”, says Jonas Wiström, CEO of Ratos.

The changes will take effect as of today, 17 January 2019.

For further information, please contact:
Jonas Wiström, CEO, Ratos, +46 8 700 17 00
Helene Gustafsson, Head of IR and Press, Ratos, +46 8 700 17 98

About Ratos:
Ratos owns and develops unlisted medium-sized companies in the Nordic countries. Our goal as an active owner is to contribute to long-term and sustainable operational development in the companies we invest in and to make value-generating transactions. Ratos’s portfolio consists of 12 medium-sized Nordic companies and the largest segments in terms of sales are Construction, Industrials and Consumer goods/Commerce. Ratos is listed on Nasdaq Stockholm and has approximately 12,300 employees.

New York, January 14, 2019 – Blackstone (NYSE:BX) today announced that Jon Korngold, a former senior leader at General Atlantic, will join the firm as a Senior Managing Director and head of Blackstone’s Growth Equity investing platform. Jon will be responsible for building and running this new platform which will provide capital to companies during the critical phase between venture capital investments and traditional buyouts.

Stephen A. Schwarzman, Blackstone Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder, said: “We are very pleased to welcome Jon Korngold to Blackstone and announce the launch of our growth equity platform.  This is a highly synergistic expansion area for the firm and a natural extension of our existing businesses. We are pleased to be growing in this area with a dynamic industry veteran like Jon, who has a successful track record investing in and building scale businesses.”

Jon Gray, Blackstone President & COO, said: “Expansion into growth equity investing represents a compelling opportunity for the firm and our Limited Partners.  Jon is the ideal leader for this new platform. He will build upon Blackstone’s capabilities and strengthen all of our investing businesses through his deep expertise in the rapidly evolving technology sector.”

Jon Korngold added: “I am pleased to join Blackstone as it expands into growth equity investing. The firm has a strong history of successfully innovating into new business areas and I am excited about the opportunity to build a world-class investing platform. The scale, geographic reach and global operating resources that Blackstone can provide fast-growing companies are unparalleled, and will be a real competitive advantage.”

At General Atlantic, Mr. Korngold was a member of the firm’s Management Committee, Chairman of the Portfolio Committee and Global Head of the firm’s Financial Services and Healthcare sectors.  In his 18 years at General Atlantic, he sourced and executed billions of dollars of growth equity investments across the technology services, enterprise software, healthcare, financial services and consumer sectors.  For each of the last three years, Mr. Korngold was ranked #1 among investors on Institutional Investor’s “Fintech Finance 40” list, which recognizes top dealmakers in the financial technology industry. Prior to General Atlantic, he worked in Goldman Sachs’ Principal Investing and M&A groups in London and New York.

About Blackstone
Blackstone is one of the world’s leading investment firms. We seek to create positive economic impact and long-term value for our investors, the companies we invest in, and the communities in which we work. We do this by using extraordinary people and flexible capital to help companies solve problems. Our asset management businesses, with $457 billion in assets under management, include investment vehicles focused on private equity, real estate, public debt and equity, non-investment grade credit, real assets and secondary funds, all on a global basis. Further information is available at www.blackstone.com. Follow Blackstone on Twitter @Blackstone.

Contact
Matt Anderson
+1-212-390-2472
matthew.anderson@blackstone.com

2018 was yet another eventful year for EQT. The various EQT buy-out funds invested in 52 companies and exited, or partially exited 18. The pace was high also on the fundraising side with three funds successfully closed; EQT Mid Market Asia III (at USD 800 million), EQT Mid-Market Credit II (at EUR 2.3 billion which was more than four times the size of its predecessor fund), and EQT VIII (at its hard cap of EUR 11 billion after less than six months of fundraising).

The EQT organization has continued to grow both geographically, with offices opened in San Francisco and Berlin, and in terms of new investment strategies, with Public Value being the most recent initiative. EQT also welcomed some 80 new colleagues to the firm and today, EQT has close to 600 employees across the globe.

Being an organization where the most important asset is the employees, it is a great pleasure to announce the yearly Partner promotions – the following Directors have been promoted to Partners, effective as of January 1, 2019.

• Brian Chang, Mid Market, Singapore
• Victor Englesson, Mid Market, Stockholm
• Stephen Escudier, Credit, New York
• Carl Johan Renström, Equity, Stockholm
• Magnus Tornling, Equity, Oslo
• Matthias Wittkowski, Equity, Munich

Christian Sinding, CEO and Managing Partner comments: “I would like to express my warmest congratulations to the new Partners. They have all demonstrated a strong dedication and an entrepreneurial spirit, providing valuable contributions to the EQT platform, our culture and values. I look forward to working together for continued success as we enter the next phase of EQT’s growth journey.”

In addition, EQT is happy to announce the recruitment of two new Partners to the EQT Ventures advisory team; Lyle Fong and Johan Svanström. Lyle has founded several companies in enterprise software and gaming, and Johan was most recently worldwide President of Hotels.com, and a member of the global management team of its parent, Expedia Group Inc. Both will be based in London.

Thomas von Koch, Deputy Managing Partner, adds: “I am thrilled about the Partner promotions, these individuals play a key role in EQT’s vision to become the most reputable investor and owner and they are truly passionate about developing companies. I also look forward to collaborating with Lyle and Johan in my new capacity focusing on EQT’s various growth areas – their experiences as serial entrepreneurs will be invaluable for EQT Ventures’ future development.”

The Board of Directors of Nordstjernan AB has appointed Peter Hofvenstam as the new CEO. Peter Hofvenstam is currently Deputy CEO and head of the Unlisted Holdings business area, which represents approximately half of Nordstjernan’s operations. He was born in 1965, has an MSc Economics, and has held various positions at Nordstjernan since 1999. He is a board member of Rosti and Swedol, as well as the chairman of Nordstjernan Kredit. Tomas Billing will continue as CEO until the transition, which will take place at the Annual General Meeting in May 2019.

“Taking Nordstjernan forward will be an exciting challenge. I look forward to work closely with our professional team to further reinforce our model of active long-term ownership in order to develop our companies and to create good returns,” says Peter Hofvenstam.

“As the chairman of Nordstjernan, it is a pleasure to present a strong internal successor to Tomas Billing. Peter has a genuine understanding of long-term value creation. He is responsible for Nordstjernan’s Unlisted Holdings, a business area that has developed very well through both growth in profits and sound business transactions. I look forward to working with Peter in his new role,” says Viveca Ax:son Johnson.

Outgoing CEO Tomas Billing will continue to work at Nordstjernan after the transition, in a role as senior advisor. He will work on nomination committees and boards in Nordstjernan’s holdings.

“I would like to thank Tomas Billing, who has been CEO for a full 20 years. When he started, Nordstjernan’s net asset value was SEK 2.7 billion, and we had one investment – NCC. Today, our net asset value is SEK 30 billion and we have 15 active investments. Two unlisted companies – Rosti and Etac – currently comprise Nordstjernan’s largest holdings. That is quite an achievement,” says Viveca Ax:son Johnson.
Questions will be answered by:

Viveca Ax:son Johnson
Chairman of Nordstjernan AB
Telephone: +46 8 788 50 18
E-mail: vaj@nordstjernan.se

Stefan Stern
Senior advisor, responsible for communications, Nordstjernan AB
Telephone: +46 70 636 74 17
E-mail: stefan.stern@nordstjernan.se
Nordstjernan AB is a family-controlled investment company whose business concept is to be an active owner that creates long-term and positive value growth. More information about Nordstjernan can be found on www.nordstjernan.se.