ECI Partners

ECI Partners is a private equity group which celebrated its 40th anniversary in June 2016 having been established by the Bank of England in 1976. It invests in small to medium-sized companies headquartered in the UK.

It organised its first management buyout for Ansafone in 1980 and was a founder member of the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association. In the first decade of ECI's investment they were active across a range of investments including syndicated transactions; early investments included Williams Holdings - owner of Chubb and Kidd - founded by Sir Nigel Rudd and Brian McGowan, and Shanks & McEwan.

From the start of the 1990s (ECI 4) the exclusive focus became UK mid-market buyouts investing in the likes of National Express Group and Bloomsbury Publishing.

The turn of the millennium saw ECI raise ECI 7 with leading growth investments including Thinkmoney and LateRooms.

In September 2014 it collected £500m, the tenth and largest fund in its 38-year history.

Fundraising began in early April 2014 with a target fund size of £400m and closed at the hard cap of £500m five months later, having been significantly oversubscribed. This made ECI the first private equity firm investing in UK-headquartered companies to raise a tenth buyout fund focused on the same strategy.

Recent investments include Edenhouse, IT Lab (IT Managed Services), Imagesound (a leading supplier of audio and screen media), and MPM (premium natural pet food company natural).

Other current investments include Tusker,Evans Cycles,Investis, ATG, Avantia, a leading online home insurance company that trades under the HomeProtect brand, and Great Rail Journeys.

Exits

The sale of Reed & Mackay (premium corporate travel company) in August 2016 was ECI's 100th exit since 1990, and generated a multiple of 3.4x cost to investors.

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