Carlyle buys AlpInvest, becomes LP

The news comes nearly six months after AlpInvest’s parents, APG and PGGM – two of the largest pension funds in the Netherlands – floated the idea of a sale. The purchase price has not been disclosed. Pending regulatory approval, Carlyle’s acquisition will be complete as of March.
“Expanding the scope of our global asset management business will create new opportunities for Carlyle investors who seek a proven fund of funds platform,” Carlyle’s Co-Founder David Rubinstein said in a statement. “By partnering with sophisticated global investors, Carlyle is better able to provide the range of products and services our investors seek.” The deal would, in fact, make Carlyle the world’s largest private equity group by assets under management, a title currently held by Blackstone.

AlpInvest claims $43.3 billion worth of private equity funds under management. It specializes in fund investments and co-investments as well as mezzanine and secondaries deals. It has offices in Amsterdam, London, New York and Hong Kong. Comparatively, buyout and growth-focused Carlyle, one of the world’s richest PE players, oversees $97.7 billion across 76 funds.

In an effort to avoid a conflict of interest situation, the companies affirmed that AlpInvest will be barred from investing in Carlyle’s funds and will maintain an “information firewall with Carlyle” that prohibits the firm from sharing information gathered from its investees. When the deal closes, AlpInvest and Carlyle anticipate an equal number of members from each firm will sit on AlpInvest’s board.

APG and PGGM floated the idea of offloading 12-year-old AlpInvest – in which they each have a 50% stake – in the middle of last year, with names like KKR and Blackstone reportedly expressing interest in the asset. By October, HarbourVest, Grosvenor Capital Management and Carlyle emerged as leaders in the auction.

The reason for the sale was never officially announced, but according to industry rumors circulating last July, APG and PGGM sought to sell the fund of funds in an effort to diversify their capital into other private equity vehicles. Other guesses included AlpInvest’s own ambitions to attract capital from third parties, and the Netherland’s Financieele Dagblad even suggested that the sale was prompted by pressure from Dutch taxpayers due to the high salaries of AlpInvest executives.

Rubinstein has said publicly that other private equity GPs may be poised to explore their options in the LP realm, as private equity majors – particularly those out of the US – begin to talk about private equity investing in a way that suggests they are exploring more of a managed accounts approach to the industry.

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• Topics
• Buyouts
• LPs
• North America
• Europe
• The Carlyle Group
• AlpInvest Partners N.V.