Entrepreneurs caught in the equity gap have a new £100m fund to apply to as a new private equity management company launches.
Key Capital Partners has been launched to specifically target the difficult to find £1-5m area of funding, which is too high to be fulfilled by business angels but is below the threshold of many venture capitalists.
The company is being led by Mike Fell, previously managing director at Granville Baird Capital Partners, Owen Trotter, formerly a partner at The Royal Bank of Canada and Peter Armitage, ex-managing director of Yorkshire Funds for the YFM Group and formerly partner at Apax.
The team boasts an average of 17 years experience in the private equity industry and feel confident of their abilities to make the new project work.
Fell said: “The obvious attractive economics of larger funds for fund managers means that £1m to £5m equity gap has become an increasingly neglected space.
“This presents a massive opportunity for us, with research showing that there are around 15,000 UK companies within our target market.
“We are well on our way to raising a £100 million fund from investors which include blue chip institutions, local authority pension funds, family trusts and high net worth individuals.
Key Capital Partners will be investing across all sectors and is looking at later stage deals including management buy-outs and buy-ins, development capital, acquisition finance and money-out deals where the business is already profitable and seeing growth.
The company has offices in Cambridge and Leeds but is focusing nationwide.
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