Gatewood Capital Partners has held a final closing of its first fund, Gatewood Capital Opportunity Fund LP, with more than $220 million in capital commitments. The fund had an initial target of $150 million. Gatewood did not use a placement agent for this fundraise.
Fund I will make seed and sponsorship investments in emerging private equity managers by providing anchor capital and expects to launch and invest in more than eight funds over the next three years. The new fund’s capital will be supplemented with co-investments from limited partners.
Gatewood is led by its Managing Partners Oren Monhite Yahav and Amir Aviv, who both lead transaction origination, structuring, execution and portfolio management, as well as the overall management of the firm. Prior to founding Gatewood in 2014, Mr. Yahav was the Executive Vice President, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Head of Capital Markets and Private Equity at Hapoalim Securities USA, a wholly owned subsidiary of Bank Hapoalim, the largest bank in Israel with total assets of $125 billion. Prior to joining Gatewood in 2016, Mr. Aviv served as Deputy CEO and Member of the Board of Management of Bank Hapoalim and he headed the bank’s international division overseeing its private banking and commercial banking operations across 13 countries.
“Our investor base includes a broad mix of domestic and international institutional investors, including a number of foundations, family offices, public pension plans, asset managers, insurance companies, and high net worth investors,” said Mr. Yahav. “We look forward to further developing our limited partner relationships and expect to make $500 million to $700 million in capital commitments over the next three years from our fund and co-investors.”
Overall, Gatewood invests in both new private equity managers and their funds, and the management companies and general partners of established private equity funds. Underlying fund strategies of the managers the firm invests in include buyouts, debt, mezzanine, direct lending, distressed, secondaries and real estate, with a geographic focus on North America and Western Europe.
“Gatewood’s approach goes beyond that of traditional fund investors. Over the past decade, our principals have built a ‘partnership culture’ based on strong alignment of interests, a high level of transparency, and a value-add approach to strategic seed investing in private equity and private debt managers,” said Mr. Aviv. “Our differentiated strategy is largely focused on supporting new managers in launching their funds. We do this by providing them with $50 million to $100 million of ‘first close’ LP capital and ongoing marketing support. We strive to maintain discipline and a culture of fiduciary responsibility with all of our underlying managers, while at the same time seeking strong risk-adjusted returns.”
Gatewood Capital Partners is based in New York (www.gatewoodcapital.com).
© 2017 Private Equity Professional | May 25, 2017