Japan's Tokio Marine Capital spins out from parent

The separation from Tokio Marine – the name change will take effect on October 1 – was driven by a desire to better align the interests of management with those of LPs, according to Koji Sasaki, the firm’s managing partner. He is now one of five co-owners of the business alongside Eisuke Shigemura, Shigeru Matsumoto, Shunichiro Nakagawa, and Kazutaka Komori.

The GP was established in 1991 as a dedicated private equity arm of Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance and began raising third-party capital seven years later. Fund I closed at JPY4 billion ($37 million) in 1998 and was followed by a JPY22 billion vehicle in 2000. Tokio Marine raised JPY33 billion and JPY23 billion for its next two flagship funds, launched either side of the global financial crisis.

Fund V came in at JPY51.7 billion, more than twice the size of its predecessor, in 2017 on the back of strong support from domestic LPs. There was no space for offshore investors. Of the 34 LPs, 17 were regional banks and they accounted for just under one-third of the total corpus. Other commitments came from pension funds, city banks, trust banks, insurers, fund-of-funds, and corporates.

Tokio Marine is retaining its LP positions in the two funds that remain active. Current portfolio companies include aerospace components manufacturer Imai Aero-Equipment, construction materials leasing business Asahi House Industry, confectionery products manufacturer Confex, and chilled desserts producer Ropia. All four were business succession deals.

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• Topics
• North Asia
• GPs
• Buyout
• Japan
• Tokio Marine Capital
• T Capital Partners