Terra Firma Capital Partners

Terra Firma Capital Partners Ltd.

Type	Private
Industry	Private equity
Predecessor	Nomura Principal Finance Group
Founded	2002 (2002)
Headquarters	London, United Kingdom
Key people	Guy Hands (Chairman) Andrew Gézcy (CEO)
Products	Investments, private equity funds
Total assets	£4.7 billion
Number of employees	100+
Website	terrafirma.com

Terra Firma Capital Partners Ltd. (TFCP) is a UK-based private equity firm. Financier Guy Hands founded the firm in 2002 through the spin-off of Nomura Principal Finance Group. The firm, which traces its roots to the formation of its predecessor in 1994, has invested over €14 billion since inception.

Terra Firma invests across a range of sectors and has focused on leveraged buyouts of large, asset-rich businesses, often with complex structural or regulatory issues. The firm often targets under-performing businesses in need of strategic, operational, or management change.

Terra Firma is headquartered in London with offices in Guernsey and Beijing. It has a staff of over 90 employees.

Terra Firma traces its origins to 1994 when Guy Hands formed Nomura Principal Finance Group, which focused on European private equity investments. Hands joined Nomura after three other banks, including his previous employer Goldman Sachs, turned down his investment plan. At Nomura, Hands and his team completed over $20 billion of leveraged buyouts. By 2000, Hands was reported to have generated profits for the bank in excess of $1.9 billion making him a star financier in London. The group’s most notable previous acquisitions included Annington Homes, as well as William Hill, the UK bookmaker, and Angel Trains, the UK

In 2002, with support from Nomura, Hands completed a spin-out of the bank's private equity operations to form Terra Firma, after first contemplating a move to another major financial institution. The previous year, there had been reports that Nomura had too much of its capital invested in the Principal Finance Group and that Hands' profile was overshadowing the bank. The existing portfolio of investments that the Principal Finance Group at Nomura held from 1994 through 2002 was transferred to a new fund named Terra Firma Capital Partners I and Terra Firma continued to manage those investments for Nomura. Nomura also provided a cornerstone commitment to Terra Firma's first independent fund, Terra Firma Capital Partners II.