Portfolio: Funds: Current

Headway Investment Partners Fund V

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A niche private equity secondaries and co-investment fund, providing a range of capital and liquidity solutions to third-party PE managers (known as General Partners or 'GPs') in European and North American buyout mid-markets.

Investment highlights

  • Date of investmentApril 2024
  • StrategySecondaries and co-investment
  • Fund managerHeadway Capital Partners
  • Target net returns>2.0x on net drawn capital
  • StatusLive

Fund strategy

The Fund's portfolio will consist of 30-40 small to mid-sized underlying PE buyouts and growth assets with attractive entry prices, low underlying leverage and low concentration risk.

Consistent with HIP V SCSp, Headway will address the capital and liquidity needs of PE managers by investing primarily in the following types of transaction:

  • Independent sponsor transactions: investing alongside managers that do not operate a blind-pool fund
  • GP-led secondaries: the sale of one or more fund deals to a continuation vehicle managed by the same manager
  • Secondary directs: the sale of several assets to another manager

The fund manager

Founded in 2004, Headway has offices in both London and Boston. The firm currently advises six funds with a combined AUM of over €1.4bn (including HIP V) and has completed more than 130 transactions to date, providing exposure to over 150 funds or investment vehicles and over 800 original underlying companies, managed by more than 140 GPs.

Successful execution of the investment strategy requires an experienced team of senior professionals, with a broad knowledge base and a deep global network. Headway has a multinational team of 18, including 11 investment professionals with significant PE and related experience. The three Founder Partners have worked together for over 20 years, including previously at Coller Capital, before spinning out to form Headway.

Why do we like this private equity secondaries fund?

  • Niche growing sector with limited competition: the independent sponsor and secondaries market is a growing market within which Headway has refined its strategy to invest in smaller complex deals where there is less competition and investment opportunities at attractive valuations.
  • Proprietary access to deal flow: More than 90% of deals are sourced off-market, avoiding expensive auction processes.
  • Experienced and professional investment team: As a deal-type specialist, Headway has refined its strategy over c.20 years, successfully investing across several market downturns.
  • Current portfolio visibility, accessed at cost, committed into ten completed transactions.

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