European Private Equity Awards 2006
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London, 6 December 2006

The European private equity industry met tonight in London for the fourth European Private Equity Awards. The event was organised by EVCA, INSEAD and Real Deals, to acknowledge and celebrate the excellence demonstrated in 2006 by the winners of awards in 14 categories.

A panel of industry experts chaired by Ross Butler, Editor of Real Deals, conducted the judging, based on research carried out by INSEAD. Ross Butler and Stuart Rock of Real Deals presented the awards to the winners in the following categories:

The award for European Fund of the Year went to Towerbrook Capital Partners for TowerBrook Investors II, for being one of very few firms in the market with a highly differentiated strategy. Towerbrook, a spin-out of Soros Private Equity raised $1.3bn for its maiden independent fund in just three months, $400m more than was originally targeted.

The European Advisory Firm of the Year awards were split into Legal, Corporate Finance and Debt Provider. SJ Berwin took the Legal award for advising on a range of fund formations including Graphite’s sale of retailer Jane Norman to Kaupthing. NM Rothschild & Sons won within the category Corporate Finance. The company has been extremely active in 2006 advising on HgCapital’s sale of Castlebeck care homes to Barchester Healthcare and Blackstone Group’s acquisition of holiday company Center Parcs to mention two. Recently reorganising its leveraged finance business to strengthen its presence in Europe, the US and Asia Pacific, Royal Bank of Scotland took the award for Debt Provider. The key deals included Apax Partners and Nordic Capitals’s £1.8bn takeprivate of Capio.

The Deal of the Year was awarded:

The Nordic (Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark) award went to EQT Partners who, with the €800m sale of cable company Com Hem made the largest absolute return in the Swedish market to date making eight to nine times its money.

In the DACH countries (Germany, Switzerland and Austria), Advent International won the award. It bought Möller Group for €100m when it was on the brink of insolvency in early 2004 and sold the business to Doughty Hanson for €1.1bn in an auction only 18 months later. The deal was categorised as being an outstanding example of a traditional private equity house taking on a difficult asset and turning it around.

In France & Benelux (France, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg) ePlanet Ventures, Index Ventures, Mangrove Capital Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners won the award for the €2.1bn sale of Skype to eBay, as one of the largest European venture-backed exits ever completed.

For the UK and Ireland the award went to Hg Capital who with the sale of Castlebeck to Barchester Healthcare, have executed an impressive growth story generating an IRR of 80 per cent for the firm and making nine times its initial investment.

Within the Mediterranean countries (Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece and Turkey) Bridgepoint and Mercapital won the award. The two companies sold Spanish wind farm business Corporación Eólicia for €1.37bn to energy group Acciona, returning three times their investment. The deal is characterised as groundbreaking and highlights the opportunities for Buyout firms in the renewable energy sector.

Within Emerging Europe (Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Russia) the award went to Advent International who, with the sale of Romanian pharmaceuticals business Terapia to India’s Ranbaxy Laboratories for $346m, generated a return of almost ten times the firm’s original $44m investment.

Skype was awarded European Venture Capital Deal of the Year. Since it was launched in 2003, Skype has grown faster than Hotmail reaching 53 million users at the time of the sale. The sale of Skype by ePlanet Ventures, Index Ventures, Mangrove Capital Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners is considered an exemplary venture capital deal.

The European Mid-Market Deal of the Year award went to Möller Group, the German electronic components company which was sold by Advent International in an auction that also attracted attention from trade buyers such as Siemens, Rockwell Automation and Eaton Corp for more than ten times the price paid by Advent International in early 2004.

The award for European Large Deal of the Year went to Apollo Management, Towerbrook Capital Partners and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners for the sale of Swiss telecoms business Cablecom for SFr2.83bn to Liberty Global. Following the sale each of the companies made more than $300m.

The final award went to Advent International in the category European Private Equity House of the Year. With 14 offices across the world, Advent truly deserves its international name and with two commendations for exceptional deals this year, the firm continues to go from strength to strength. The company continues to explore new territories and has recently completed a number of deals in Turkey.

Introducing the awards, Javier Loizaga commented:

“Tonight’s awards show that Europe is capable of excellence across all areas: nurturing world leading technology, restructuring investee companies or bringing them to the next stage of development. Not only this but Europe’s buyout and venture professionals produce outstanding returns for their investors.”

Ross Butler Editor, Real Deals, said:

“In a year of outstanding returns for the private equity industry, these awards mark out investors of the very highest standard. Our expert and impartial panel of judges have made this event the European private equity industry’s premier awards ceremony. I would also like to extend my thanks to EVCA, without which the evening would not have been possible.”

Notes to Editors:

EVCA

The European Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (EVCA), established in 1983 and based in Brussels, promotes, facilitates and represents the needs and interests of the private equity and venture capital industry in Europe. EVCA has over 925 members in 50 countries, including the leading fund managers in the European private equity and venture capital industry. In 2005, the private equity industry raised €72 billion from institutional investors and invested €47 billion in Europe's growth companies.

Real Deals

Europe’s leading magazine for the private equity and venture capital industry, Real Deals has more full-time journalists specialising in the asset class than any other publication. The magazine is published every two weeks, but ever since its launch as a monthly in October 2003 Real Deals has been winning many venture capitalist awards for journalism.

For further information, please contact:

Jeanette Nielsen, Public Relations Officer, EVCA
Tel + 32 2 715 00 29, email: jeanette.nielsen@evca.com