News

Ardian has acquired UniCredit’s infrastructure private equity portfolio that is valued at 300 million euros. The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of this year. UniCredit is a Pan-European commercial bank.

PRESS RELEASE

New York, July 28, 2017 – Ardian, the independent private investment company, announces it has signed a Sale and Purchase Agreement in July 2017 with UniCredit for the acquisition of a ~€300 million portfolio of limited partnership interests in European infrastructure private equity funds. Closing of the transaction is expected in 3Q17 subject to the approval and rules of the fund manager. This deal represents one of the largest secondary infrastructure transactions in 2017 and confirms Ardian’s leadership in secondary infrastructure Funds of Funds.

UniCredit is a simple successful Pan European Commercial Bank, with a fully plugged in CIB, delivering a unique Western, Central and Eastern European network to its extensive client franchise: 25 million clients. UniCredit offers local expertise as well as an international one reaching and supporting its clients globally, providing them with unparalleled access to leading banks in its 14 core markets as well as in other 18 countries worldwide.

This transaction continues Ardian’s secondary funds strategy to offer liquidity to large institutions looking to rebalance their portfolios and monetize their private equity investments. In 2016, the Ardian Fund of Funds team totaled $4.8 billion of secondary, infrastructure secondary and early secondary transactions worldwide.

“This is the culmination of a highly collaborative relationship with UniCredit,” said Mark Benedetti, Managing Director and Co-Head of Ardian US. “This acquisition highlights our unique ability to complete significant and complex transactions which offer secondary liquidity to large institutions such as Unicredit. Our scale and knowledge of the assets meant we were perfectly placed to support its strategy.”

“Our team, spread out across the globe, is able to access a vast amount of information via a database of 1,400 funds and 10,000 underlying companies, which gives us excellent perspective on pricing and quality, allowing us to be opportunistic on behalf of our investors,” said Mark Benedetti.

ABOUT ARDIAN
Ardian, founded in 1996 and led by Dominique Senequier, is a premium independent private investment company with assets of US$62 billion managed or advised in Europe, North America and Asia. The company keeps entrepreneurship at its heart and delivers investment performance to its global investors while fueling growth in economies across the world. Ardian’s investment process embodies three values: excellence, loyalty and entrepreneurship. Ardian’s employees form the largest shareholder group. Over 80 percent of employees have invested in the company, which is a testament to their trust in the management and the corporate strategy.

Ardian maintains a truly global network, with more than 460 employees working through twelve offices in Beijing, Frankfurt, Jersey, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Milan, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Singapore and Zurich. The company offers its 580 investors a diversified choice of funds covering the full range of asset classes, including Ardian Funds of Funds (primary, early secondary and secondary), Ardian Private Debt, Ardian North America Direct Buyout, Direct Funds (Ardian Mid Cap Buyout, Ardian Expansion, Ardian Growth, Ardian Co-Investment), Ardian Infrastructure, Ardian Real Estate and customized mandate solutions with Ardian Mandates. www.ardian.com

ABOUT UNICREDIT
UniCredit is a simple successful Pan European Commercial Bank, with a fully plugged in CIB, delivering a unique Western, Central and Eastern European network to its extensive client franchise: 25 million clients.

UniCredit offers local expertise as well as an international one reaching and supporting its clients globally, providing them with unparalleled access to leading banks in its 14 core markets as well as in other 18 countries worldwide. UniCredit European banking network includes Italy, Germany, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey.