Who Do I Rate?

I get a surprising number of emails from overseas investors who are considering allocating capital to Australian private equity and want to know more about the players in this market.  It got me thinking . . .  which firms would I trust with my own money? 

There have been some clear winners in the buyout and mid-market areas, and I'd be pretty confident putting my bank balance in the hands of any of the firms listed below (in fact, getting access to some of these funds is becoming a challenge for LPs).  Early stage is much tougher to pick-- so few firms have a real track record. 

Here goes.  And to make it interesting let's limit it to just three star firms in each segment:

BUYOUT (EV>$150m):  CHAMP, Ironbridge, Archer Capital.

MID-MKT ($30m-$150m): Quadrant, Champ Ventures, RMB Capital Partners.

EARLY STAGE:  GBS Venture Partners, Starfish Ventures, CM Capital.

Comments

[james]

Thanks for the post. We are always looking to establish investment relationships outside of the US. We've never invested with Australian managers. You mention that you would put your bank balance with any of these managers, but do these managers have a wide network of LPs? My impression is that some have sole LPs and could not be accessed even if so desired. I look forward to hearing more of your "local knowledge" about who is who in Australian private equity.

FYI - a few of the links are dead.

Thanks again.

[GP]

Thanks, I've fixed the bad links. Not sure why that happens-- Typepad can be tempermental.

RMB Capital Partners is the only firm on the list that has a sole LP (actually they get funds from two LPs in South Africa). I know RMB has had offers from other LPs, but to-date they've stuck with their anchor investors.

All the other firms have reasonably wide LP networks. Access is starting to get tougher as they build their track records.

[Andrew Andrews]

I agree with most of your rankings. However RMB has lost all of their deal transactors over the past 6 months. As you know team is everything in the industry so I think including them in that list would a re think.