UK- Five partners in the UK team of UBS Capital, the private equity company formerly known as Phildrew Ventures, have launched a new entity IRRfc specialising in taking on the management of institutional investors’ unwanted private equity holdings. IRRfc will focus exclusively on exit strategies and will not be making investments itself.

The partners have bought IRRfc from UBS Capital, the private equity division of the Swiss banking group. Frank Neale, one of the founding partners, believes they have identified a gap in the private equity market. “There are a number of institutions that entered private equity in the 1990s which have had a recent change of strategy and now find it very difficult to exit from their investments,” he says.

It sees a market for its services among banks, insurance companies, pension funds, corporate venturers, secondary investment funds and venture capital firms that want to divest their residual investments. The company has already compiled a list of 20 institutions potentially keen to dispose of their holdings.

It will charge a management fee and a proportion of the disposal proceeds and in return offer help to find managers for the investors’ portfolios. It is also acting as advisor to the remaining Phildrew Ventures funds, valued at £300m.

The partners- Ian Hawkins, Robert Jenkins, Ruth Storm, Frank Neale and Chris Tennant hold between then non-executive directorships of 19 portfolio companies in industries ranging from food production to construction and retailing.

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