Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

Cambridge will be at the very heart of the venture capital combine, whose investment portfolio and profile will be international.

The new partnership is subject to approval by the CPE Limited Partners and receiving regulatory consents, and is expected to launch formally in mid-2006. The new partnership will have:-

• Assets under management of £285m focused on European Venture Capital

• An impressive track record with major European VC exits in the last two years

• A combined management team with over 100 years of venture capital experience

• Committed capital of around £100m available for new and follow-on investments

The company will have offices in London and Cambridge. The combined team, which brings together considerable experience of investing in Europe and Silicon Valley, has helped build some of the most successful venture exits in Europe in recent years including: KVS, acquired by Veritas for $225 million; Alphamosaic acquired by Broadcom for $125 million; and FillFactory, acquired by Cypress for $100 million.

The CPE team will be spun out of parent company Cazenove Capital Management and will continue to manage the New Europe Access Fund, a £234m Limited Partnership raised from a combination of leading European institutional investors, private investors and Cazenove Capital Management itself.

The existing team from Prelude, led by Bob Hook and Alan Duncan will continue to manage Prelude Trust plc, a quoted investment trust capitalised at some £46 million.

Simon Cook will be chief executive of the new partnership and Bob Hook chairman. Stuart Chapman and Alan Duncan will be managing partners. The new group will have a total of 17 combined partners and staff.

Cook said: “This partnership brings together the early stage skills of Prelude with the later stage expertise of Cazenove Private Equity, creating a superb platform to support Europe’s leading entrepreneurs in IT, telecoms, media and healthcare at all stages of their business ambitions.”

Hook added: “CPE represents the perfect partner for Prelude to address the exceptional venture investment opportunities that exist in Europe.

“Our focus will continue to be on producing significant capital returns for our shareholders and investors by supporting leading entrepreneurs as equity partners. We are a major new player with substantial funds available for investment and a track record of successful exits.”

Tod Bensen, founding CEO of CPE, has decided to return to the US at the conclusion of the spin out and merger process, after 20 years in London with Cazenove.