Roc Partners hits $120m third close on fourth Asia fund

The vehicle achieved a first close of $36 million in December 2018 and a second close of $60 million one year later. The original target was $100 million, and the hard cap has been set at $150 million. A final close is expected in June.

LPs include Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, New York State & Local Retirement Systems, and Oregon Public Employees Retirement System, as well as a number of family offices and high net worth individuals, predominantly from Australia and the US.

The fund will target a range of strategies, primarily focusing on the middle market but with the flexibility to participate in the start-up and large-cap segments. There will be a particular emphasis on secondaries, which has been identified as an enhanced opportunity set in light of the coronavirus-driven downturn.

“The secondary market in Asia is still at a relatively nascent stage but is expected to grow significantly in the future, in part driven by significant growth in the primary market, but also because distributions have lagged investments over the last 5-10 years, and the recent dislocation that’s happened across markets is likely to result in an increased need for liquidity going forward,” Frewen Lam, a senior partner at Roc, told AVCJ.

“That gives an opportunity for patient investors to acquire assets at more reasonable pricing, especially for those that have patient capital that can wait for a recovery in the overall market as they exit those positions.”

The implied buying opportunity presented by the macro stresses of COVID-19 has been tempered in the secondaries market by a range of uncertainties around pricing, the ability to conduct due diligence, and practical deal execution in jurisdictions under government lockdown. Much of the near-term activity in this space is therefore expected to focus on hybrid, company-level deals, which typically see a struggling portfolio company raise a down round or flat round through a mix of primary and secondary commitments.

Roc was established as a fund-of-funds under Macquarie Group in 1996 and spun out as an independent entity in 2014. The firm, which operates out of Sydney, Hong Kong, and Tokyo, has about A$6.4 billion ($3.9 billion) in assets under management. It claims to have made more than 300 investments across Asia Pacific, about half of which were secondary or co-investment transactions.

Roc’s third Asia Pacific fund closed at $130 million in 2018, missing its target of $300 million, according to AVCJ Research. Previous fundraising activity also includes a A$150 million vehicle targeting small to medium-sized businesses in New South Wales with LP support from the local government and First State Super.

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• Topics
• Australasia
• Fundraising
• Fund-of-funds
• Secondaries
• Australia
• Asia
• ROC Partners