Toby Lewis

Having come close to its €4 billion target, the European buyout firm is looking to wrap up fundraising by May.

Simon Walker has supported growing momentum to make the transparency reforms apply beyond the UK shortly after PEO revealed they currently affect only 32 portfolio companies.

Palamon has recruited Italian buyout professional Valerio Boccardi in its second appointment this year.

CVC, led by chairman Michael Smith, has raised Europe’s largest-ever private equity fund in spite of credit market problems making larger buyouts difficult to achieve.

The two Middle Eastern firms and regional bank Dubai Islamic Bank have raised a Shariah-compliant vehicle that will invest alongside Global Investment House’s planned $1.5 billion global fund.

The Egyptian bank’s private equity arm has scaled up its fund size after making an internal rate of return of more than 70 percent over two years on realised investments from its previous fund.

Pantheon Ventures’ listed fund of funds achieved a rise in net asset value per share during the second half of 2007, which ensured that it outperformed stock market benchmarks.

UBS investment banker Olivier Sarkozy has joined The Carlyle Group’s recently formed financial services team. The team aims to exploit low valuations in the financial services sector, which has been hit by recent worldwide credit market problems.

The Swiss mid-market buyout firm has almost doubled the size of its fund scaling up against the domestic competition.

The Norwegian firm, led by Ole Ertvaag, completed fundraising in three months, capitalising on the interest in the booming oil and gas sector to more than double its fund size.