Films produced by August Equity to cover the investment in Boat International and the exit of Discovery Group have both been awarded prestigious awards at the US international film and video festival.
"August Equity has blended great storytelling with modern technology to turn the dreary old corporate video on its head," said Nick McAlpine, director at Bladonmore and producer of both films. "The firm beat a number of rivals to these awards and we are absolutely delighted that peers recognise the quality of the work." To see the award-winning videos click here.
August Equity has sold InterMed, the industrial products and services business focused on manufacturing and selling anaesthesia products globally, to US private equity firm Altaris.
The deal provides an exit for August Equity managed funds nearly five years after the original investment was made. August Equity purchased the business from 3i before embarking on a series of initiatives to enhance its value. These included the appointment of Simon Armstrong as chief executive in 2004, who spearheaded a push into new markets and the development of a range of products.
"We have enjoyed working with Simon and the management team at InterMed," said Ian Grant, partner at August Equity. "Since being appointed, he has introduced a number of value-added engineering techniques, which have proved to be strong drivers of growth for the business."
Armstrong thanked August Equity for the positive influence it had on the company: "August Equity has played a major role in driving the growth of the business in recent years."
New owner Altaris, a specialist healthcare investor from the US, is keen to use the base that InterMed has built in North America and support its expansion throughout the region. "InterMed is an attractive investment opportunity for us," said Altaris managing director George E Aitken-Davies. "The company has established a presence in the US market and we look forward to working with Simon and his team to accelerate growth in the future."
Video Arts, a leading provider of video-based learning programmes, has been sold by August Equity to AIM-listed TV production company Tinopolis.
The Video Arts film catalogue, which now includes more than 200 titles and features celebrities such as Jamie Oliver, has been used to train people in 50 countries and has won more than 200 training awards in the process. During the period it was in the August Equity portfolio, a number of new initiatives were launched, including the development of a web design consultancy to deliver online sales channels for the company, which has emerged as a key part of the group's sales and marketing strategy.
August Equity has tweaked the definitions of its four sectors to bring them into line with current practice and definitions.
Two of the four sectors - media and technology - have been merged into a single area of focus that blends content creation and distribution, which is exactly how advisory firms and media companies treat these assets. Healthcare remains, but specialist manufacturing is now split in two, according to whether the company is focused on industrial or consumer products and services. "This is evolution not revolution," said Sam Watkinson, partner at August Equity. "It is a refinement of our four sectors and merely updates them to represent what is happening in the marketplace."
Fellow partner Philip Rattle agreed: "We have not changed our sector focus, but merely changed the way in which we define those investment areas to align ourselves better to the definitions and terminology utilised by our key advisers."
The growing strength of the August Equity team was underlined by a series of promotions earlier this year. The moves are indicative of the firm's commitment to strengthening the team.
Sam Watkinson, who joined August Equity in June 2005 and is responsible for managing the co-ordination for deal origination, has been promoted to partner and Fraser Davidson and David Ramsey have been promoted to investment directors. Fraser has been with August Equity since 2002, most recently working on the Boat International buy-out, where he became a company non-executive director. David joined in 2005 to work on deals across all four sectors.
Martin Horne, who has been with the firm since 2004,has been promoted to portfolio director and will continue to help manage the firm's investment portfolio alongside partner Ian Grant. Since joining the company, Martin has been involved in a number of exits, including Hale Hamilton, RedSky IT, ETT, Securistyle, Video Arts and InterMed.
In addition to the promotions across the investment team, August Equity is pleased to announce the promotion of Louise Ward to investor relations and marketing manager. Louise has been with the company since 2003 and led the successful re-branding of August Equity in 2006. Meanwhile, Donna Wade has been promoted to management accountant. Donna joined August Equity in 2000 and is responsible for reporting the financial results of the management company.
"These promotions reflect the levels of quality, dedication and experience we expect," said joint managing partner Richard Green. "Sam, Fraser, David and Martin have shown excellent management capabilities and have helped develop the relationships within our network, which is pivotal to the work we do. Louise's promotion reflects her efforts to ensure that the August Equity brand was successfully embedded among our investors, as well as the greater financial community. Donna has worked extremely hard for us over the past seven years and we are delighted to recognise this by rewarding her with this well earned promotion."
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