Unigestion’s fourth Secondaries Opportunities Fund sees successful first close

Unigestion, the boutique asset manager with scale that focuses on guiding its clients with risk-managed investment solutions, today announces that it has successfully held the first close of its fourth dedicated private equity secondaries fund, Unigestion Secondaries Opportunities IV (USO IV). This fund represents a continuation of the secondaries strategy that Unigestion has successfully deployed since 2000. The firm’s two previous secondary funds, USO II and III, have each delivered strong performance, having benefitted from high quality investment opportunities at attractive valuations. USO IV has now received commitments in excess of EUR 177 million, which is almost 60% of the fund’s target size. Unigestion is seeking total commitments of EUR 300 million.

USO IV seeks transactions at the smaller end of the secondary market, in which high-quality assets can be acquired at attractive valuations. It focuses on small and middle-market funds, fund restructurings, secondary direct portfolios and structured transactions. It has a net return target of 1.6x cost / 20% IRR.

Christophe de Dardel, Head of Private Equity, at Unigestion commented: “We continue to see compelling investment opportunities at the smaller end of the secondary market. Through a network of fund managers, limited partners and deal introducers which we have developed over 20 years, we are able to source attractively-priced deals on a bilateral basis. We expect dealflow to remain robust for the foreseeable future, especially as the large number of funds which were raised from 2006 to 2008 are now approaching the end of their lives and require liquidity solutions for the existing limited partners.”