Mid-Market Buyout House of the Year
ECI
It has been an exceptional 12 months of performance for ECI, with funds ECI 10 and 11 seeing 7exits, generating an average return of 4.7x gross MOIC and 58% gross IRR. These exits have delivered proceeds of £1.1bn, greater than the entire invested capital base of ECI 10 and 11 combined, taking ECI 10 to a market-leading DPI of 2.5x just 8 years since its first investment.
In the last 12 months ECI has launched a Growth Specialist panel, appointing functional experts in areas such as People, Technology and Sales. This now means over 40% of the ECI investment team is there to offer hands on support with value add to the portfolio. This approach has led to portfolio revenue growth of 20%+ over the period. The portfolio has now seen annual revenue growth of 20%+ every quarter since Q3 2020.
ECI launched its ECI 12 fundraise in the last year and expects it will close at the hard cap of £1bn by end of September 2023. ECI 12 is an Article 8 fund and ECI has further evolved on ESG with a robustESG toolkit developed to support the portfolio, and a B Corp application completed in 2023.
Equistone Partners Europe
In the past 12 months, Equistone Partners Europe worked closely with its portfolio of mid-market businesses throughout the UK and continental Europe to support them amid significant macroeconomic headwinds while continuing to realise investments, execute new acquisitions and support bolt-ons.
Equistone signed or completed seven successful exits in this period, including Acuity Knowledge Partners and Bulgin in the UK, generating €2.5bn for its LPs.
Equistone also deployed capital through its active pipeline of new platform investments, investing in Virgin Experience Days, Talon and Nexus Vehicle Rental in the UK.
Equistone has worked closely with its investee companies to navigate the issues of supply chain complexity, inflation, rising interest rates and falling consumer confidence while also providing the operational support required for portfolio companies engaging in a buy-and-build strategy. This included seven add-ons by UK portfolio companies and another 20 across continental Europe. Additionally, Equistone appointed three ESG managers in Q4 2022 to help drive the firm's sustainability objectives across its European portfolio.
Particular highlights during the judging period include:
Landmark exit of Acuity Knowledge Partners to Permira in January of this year.
Inaugural single-asset continuation fund transaction via Equistone’s exit of Sicame.
Completing 27 bolt-on acquisitions across its portfolio.
Inflexion
In the 12-month judging period, Inflexion announced 9 exits with a combined enterprise value of £2.7bn , returning proceeds of £1.3bn and an average money multiple of 4.2x. During the period the portfolio grew revenue by 20% with the portfolio now seeing annual revenue growth of 20%+ every quarter since Q3 2020. We also completed 7 investments with a combined value of £2.3bn and over 35 portfolio acquisitions across 11 countries. We are also proud that the Inflexion Foundation donated £1.6m to several charities during the judging period.
The phenomenal period for the firm is a testament to the ambition of the people both within Inflexion and the teams we back. To ensure we remain well resourced to address the growing opportunity we see, we increased our headcount from 130 to 158 during the 12-month period. Inflexion has been backing ambitious management teams to growth their businesses for over 24 years. We benefit from three core fund strategies six sector teams covering Business Services, Technology, Healthcare, Industrials, Consumer and Financial Services, and a dedicated in-house value acceleration team, which has been bolstered by senior hires this year, covering M&A, international expansion, digital transformation, commercial strategy, ESG and talent management. The value acceleration and capital markets have provided significant support to Inflexion’s portfolio companies in the current uncertain economic environment.
Montagu
Montagu is a leading mid-market private equity firm, committed to finding and growing businesses that make the world work.
Montagu specialises in carve-out and other first time buyout investments and has deep expertise in five priority sectors: Healthcare, Financial Sector Services, Critical Data, Digital Infrastructure and Education. ESG forms an integral part of its strategy, and its commitment to sustainable investment is fully integrated into its investment and value-creation process. Montagu partners with companies with enterprise values between €150 million and €2 billion and has €11bn assets under management.
Since Q2-22, portfolio revenue grew by 21% and saw 14% growth in EBITDA across the portfolio. There were 36 bolt on acquisitions in the portfolio and Montagu exited 3 businesses. Furthermore, we are proud to be one of the first private equity firms to have our emissions reduction target validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), confirming our commitment to acting on climate change and building sustainable businesses. We have already made significant progress towards this target, with 10 portfolio companies having made a Board commitment to set a science- based target and a 71% reduction in firm-level Scope 1 and 2 emissions (exceeding our 70% reduction target).
Synova
In 2022 Synova was recognised as the 12th best performing manager in the world in the HEC Paris-Dow Jones Small-Cap Buyout Performance Ranking and ranked as both the Top Performing PrivateEquity Fund Manager and Top Performing Buyout Fund Manager in Europe in 2023 by Preqin.
Synova's portfolio generated average revenue growth of 44% and EBITDA growth of 54% with the overall value of the portfolio increasing by 25% from May 2022 to May 2023. Synova’s average return on realised investments is 6.2x invested capital.
Synova IV (2019) is performing strongly and on track to deliver gross returns of at least 4x and Synova III (2016) in excess of 5x. Synova completed three new platform investments in the period, as well as supporting existing portfolio companies in making 43 bolt-on's.
Synova IV’s successor fund, Fund V, held its first and final close in July 2022 at the hard cap of £875million, surpassing its original £750 million target, in just three months. Synova V received overwhelming support from existing investors, with 99% of Fund IV investors recommitting. On average existing investors increased their commitments by over 50%. A select group of new investors were admitted to the heavily oversubscribed Fund.