KKR has raised its largest buyout fund since 2007 and the world’s second-largest since 2013, closing its Americas XII fund on $13.9 billion, including $1.4 billion of the firm’s own cash.
KKR
It’s the most capital commitments gathered by KKR since a $17.6 billion fund in 2006. Among all investors, meanwhile, the only larger new buyout fund raised since the start of 2014 is Blackstone’s seventh flagship vehicle, according to the PitchBook Platform, a fund that closed on about $18 billion in December 2015. KKR’s new vehicle will have a diverse mandate, pursuing both majority and minority deals across a gamut of industries.
Other major firms have recently closed massive new funds of their own, including Advent International ($13 billion) and Leonard Green & Partners ($9.6 billion). And KKR’s fund might soon have even more company. Vista Equity Partners is currently raising a new fund that could exceed $10 billion, Silver Lake is said to be eyeing $12.5 billion for its latest vehicle and Apollo Global Management could reportedly approach the $20 billion mark with its next fund.
Those are just some of the data points that led our 2016 Private Equity & Venture Capital Fundraising Report to herald a return of the mega-fund that began last year and could continue into the foreseeable future.
In seemingly unrelated news, KKR will also soon have to handle the departure of a longtime executive. The firm’s head of UK & Ireland and its European healthcare team, Dominic Murphy, will leave the KRR to invest on his own, according to the Financial Times. Based in London, Murphy has worked at the firm since 2005 and currently represents the firm on a number of boards of directors, including Walgreens Boots Alliance.
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Article by Kevin Dowd, PitchBook
