36 VENTURE CAPITAL FIRM
OF THE YEAR AWARD
SPONSORED BY LEUMI ABL WINNER ISIS Equity Partners
Above: Benoit Broch of ISIS Equity Partners
Right: Presenter Dominic Holland (left) with Benoit Broch, Daniel Smith of ISIS and Jonathan Hughes of sponsor Leumi ABL
There was a new name added to the illustrious list of winners of Venture Capital Firm of the Year, after ISIS Equity Partners scooped top honours in the first award of the night.
It edged out 2010 title holder LDC, as well as fellow contender ECI Partners to take home the award, which was sponsored for the second time by Leumi ABL.
A key platform for ISIS’s success was its support for a secondary buyout of Autologic Diagnostic Holdings by the existing management team for £46m. The company, which has its headquarters in Oxford, manufactures high level car diagnostic equipment. ISIS won the deal against strong competition thanks to its ability to offer a flexible solution which met the various vendors’ differing needs and it completed in just eight weeks. The Autologic deal was one of five shortlisted for the evening’s Deal of the Year (over £25m) award later in the evening.
In addition, one nomination highlighted the “fantastic result” ISIS achieved when it successfully sold its investment in Portsmouth-based Wiggle, the leading online cycling and tri-sports retailer, in a deal valued overall at £180m. ISIS had originally invested in 2006 when the business was
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turning over £12m, and by the time it was sold, turnover was closer to £120m.
Benoit Broch, investment director, ISIS Equity Partners, was presented with the award by Jonathan Hughes, regional sales director of Leumi ABL.
Broch said afterwards: “The Thames Valley and Solent has always been a great source of opportunity for ISIS and we have been fortunate to back some very talented and ambitious management teams in the region over the last 20 years.
“Recognition as VC Firm of the Year in the region follows one of our most recent success stories after the sale of Solent-based cycling e-tailor Wiggle in December 2011. When we backed Wiggle in 2006 they had just moved to new premises in Portsmouth and by December 2011 they were shipping to customers across the globe. We have also recently invested in Oxford-based Autologic and look forward to working with the team there in the years to come.
“The recent successful close of our £360m ISIS V fundraising means we are in a great position to continue to invest and support businesses in the Thames Valley and Solent regions as they pursue their growth ambitions.”
THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – MAY 2012
As one of the longest-established and most successful PE groups in the UK, ECI Partners was nominated for one of its key deals in 2011, when it backed the founders of Marlow-based Wireless Logic in a £35m MBO to buy the business from Phones International Group, owned by Dragons’ Den star and serial entrepreneur Peter Jones. Wireless Logic is the UK’s leading machine- to-machine communications specialist and has some 3,600 customers and nearly 600,000 SIMS under management in the UK and continental Europe.
LDC, which won the title in 2010, was shortlisted once again. Part of the Lloyds Banking Group, LDC is the leading UK regional mid-market private equity house, supporting businesses with equity of between £2m and £100m. In 2011 it backed the merger of EDM Group with Sala International; and successfully sold its stake in the £60m acquisition of Davies Group by management and Electra Capital.
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