CVC Capital Partners

CVC Capital Partners

Type	Private
Industry	Private equity
Founded	1981
Headquarters	Luxembourg
Key people	Steve Koltes, Donald Mackenzie, Rolly van Rappard
Products	Private equity, venture capital, credit asset management
Website	www.cvc.com

CVC Capital Partners is a private equity firm with approximately US$80 billion in secured commitments across European and Asian private equity, credit and growth funds. In total, the CVC Group manages over US$52 billion of assets. Since 1981, CVC has completed over 300 investments across a wide range of industries and countries. CVC was founded in 1981 and today has over 400 employees working across its network of 24 offices throughout Europe, Asia and the Americas.

History

Founding

American banking giant, Citicorp, had established an investment arm in 1968 to focus on venture capital investments. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Citicorp Venture Capital, at that time under the leadership of chairman William T. Comfort, continued to invest in early-stage businesses but also expanded into the emerging leveraged buyout business. CVC Capital Partners was originally founded in 1981 as the European arm of Citicorp Venture Capital.

Among Citicorp Venture Capital's early managing directors in Europe were John Botts, Otto Van der Wyck, Jon Moulton and Frank Neale. Of the group's original European leadership, most would leave by the late 1980s. Botts left in 1987 to found his own boutique investment banking firm, Botts & Company. Moulton left the bank to co-found Schroder Ventures (the predecessor of Permira) in 1985. The following year, Van der Wyck left to co-found European private equity firm BC Partners in 1986 and today serves as chairman of AlpInvest and a senior advisor to Coller Capital. Neale also departed to join Phildrew Ventures, which subsequently became UBS Capital and later IRRfc.

Spinout from Citicorp and the 1990s

By the early 1990s, Michael Smith, who joined Citicorp in 1982, was leading Citicorp Venture Capital in Europe along with other managing directors Steven Koltes, Hardy McLain, Donald Mackenzie, Iain Parham, and Rolly Van Rappard. In 1993, Smith and the senior investment professionals of Citicorp Venture Capital negotiated a spinout from Citibank to form an independent private equity firm, CVC Capital Partners.^[1] In 2006, the US arm of Citigroup Venture Capital also spun out of the bank to form a new firm, known as Court Square Capital Partners. CVC operated offices in London, Paris and Frankfurt.

Following the spinout, CVC raised its first investment fund with $300 million of commitments, half coming from Citicorp and the rest from high-net-worth individuals and institutional investors. Now independent, CVC also completed its transition from venture capital investments to leveraged buyouts and investments in mature businesses. CVC would follow up with its second fund in 1996, its first fully independent of Citibank, with $840 million of capital commitments.

Since 2000

By 2000, CVC was one of the largest and best known private equity firms in Europe. In 2001, CVC completed fundraising for its third investment fund, which was the largest private equity fund raised in Europe at the time, just ahead of funds raised by other leading firms, Apax Partners and BC Partners^[2] Also, around the same time, CVC expanded into Asia with a $750 million fund focusing exclusively on investments in Asian companies.

In 2007, CVC expanded to the U.S., opening an office in New York City, headed by Christopher Stadler and overseen by Rolly van Rappard.^[3]

Since 2010

In January 2013, Smith retired from the role of chairman and Koltes, Mackenzie and Van Rappard were appointed co-chairmen of the group.^[4]

In June 2015, CVC acquired the German perfume retailer Douglas AG for an disclosed fee from US private equity firm Advent International.^[5]

In September 2015, CVC opened an office in Warsaw.^[6]

In November 2015, CVC and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board both acquired American pet supplier Petco for a fee of around $4.6 billion.^[7]

In April 2016, CVC Capital Partners acquired German betting operator Tipico.^[8]

In September 2016, CVC Capital Partners agreed to sell control of Formula One to John Malone’s Liberty Media in a deal worth $4.4bn. The two-part deal would see the US media group buy 18.7 per cent of the F1 parent company Delta Topco for $746mn in cash from a consortium of shareholders led by CVC. In 2017, a second payment of $354mn in cash and $3.3bn in newly issued shares in a Liberty Media tracking stock will see Liberty Media assume full control of Formula One once the deal is approved by regulators, the FIA and Liberty’s shareholders.^[9]

Investment funds

Investments

Europe and the United States

The current European and US portfolio contains a number of companies, including:

• Avast: IT security company;^[12]
• Formula One Group: motor sport management business;
• RAC: automotive rescue service provider in the UK;^[13]
• Cortefiel: apparel retailers in Spain;
• Leslie's Pool Supplies: U.S. retailer of swimming pool supplies;
• Fraikin: truck leasing;
• PKP Energetyka: Polish railway network electricity distributor;
• Petco Holdings Inc.: major pet supplies retail chain;^[14]
• Sky Bet: online betting and gambling company;^[15]
• Kount: online fraud detection provider;^[16]
• Stage Entertainment: European theatre group.^[17]

Asia-Pacific

The current Asia Pacific portfolio includes:

• SPi Global: Philippines-based BPO company (80/20 ownership between CVC and PLDT);
• Arteria Networks: network solutions provider;^[18]
• SRS Korea: fast food franchise operator;^[19]
• The Executive Centre: Hong Kong-based serviced office operator;^[20]
• PT Softex Indonesia: paper-based personal care products manufacturer;^[21]
• Magnum Corporation: Malaysian lottery operator.

Controversies

In January 2015, CVC Capital Partners and Bencis Capital Partners were sentenced to pay fines by the Dutch Authority for Consumers and Markets after it charged the former Dutch portfolio company of the two firms, Meneba Beheer, with breaking competition rules through price fixing.^[22]

The Dutch regulator ruled that the two firms must pay between €450,000 and €1.5 million after Meneba Beheer, which was itself fined €9 million by the authority, was involved in a collective agreement with competitors to keep prices stable between 2001 and 2007.

CVC's management of their majority holding in Formula One has been criticised by team owners for extracting billions of dollars in profits in the same manner as the Notorious Corporate Raiders of the 80’s, while giving nothing back to the sport.

References

External links

• CVC Capital Partners

Private equity and venture capital
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