Flexstone Partners SAS (“Flexstone”) is a majority owned affiliate of Natixis Investment Managers (“Natixis IM”), one of the world’s largest asset managers, and was established to provide global institutional investors with investment management and advisory services across global private markets. Flexstone’s entrepreneurial mindset and nimble team, ability to access superior investment opportunities and leverage its professional network enhance its drive to continuously deliver exceptional investment performance, client services, and risk management.
By way of background, Flexstone is the combination of four regional entities: Paris-based Euro Private Equity SAS, Geneva-based Euro Private Equity Sàrl (together with Euro Private Equity SAS referred to as “Euro-PE”), New York-based Caspian Private Equity LLC (“Caspian PE”), and Singapore-based Eagle Asia Partners Pte Ltd (“Eagle Asia”). Euro-PE was founded by Eric Deram in 2005 to invest in the lower middle market in Europe. The private equity business of Caspian Capital Management (“CCM”), an existing Natixis IM affiliate, was started in 2006 by Nader Motamedy, Benoit Jacquin, Satyan Malhotra, and other professionals and spun-off as Caspian PE in 2008 to invest in the lower, middle and growth markets in the US. Sponsored by Natixis IM, Eagle Asia was founded in 2007 by Jimmy Hsu, Lay Hong Lee, Kit Jong Tan and Ivy Omar to execute a similar strategy in Asia. In 2013, Euro-PE entered into an agreement to be acquired by Natixis IM in order to leverage Natixis IM’s global distribution platform. In 2014, the Euro-PE and Caspian PE teams discussed and commenced a partnership to leverage their teams and deep market expertise to collaborate on a global and competitive investment offering.
In 2017, at the initiative of the Managing Partners to capitalize on the experience of managing global separately managed accounts (“SMAs”) while Natixis IM was finalizing its decision to increase its focus on Alternatives (in the context of its “New Dimension” strategic plan), these entities were merged in order to enhance its private market offerings to global institutional investors. As such, the four affiliates were rebranded, and, on 01/01/2019, began to operate under the name of Flexstone Partners within Natixis IM.
Given the similar investment philosophy and strategies (i.e., focus on Primary Fund investing, Secondary Fund investing, and Co-investing in lower middle market and growth companies) across the four entities, the merger was extremely complementary. Accordingly, it provided Flexstone with global investment reach while retaining its very strong local footing with its longstanding presence of more than 15 years in each of its respective markets. The merger allowed Flexstone to streamline its business to better service clients, be more competitive in its respective markets, and expand the scope of its investment geographies to offer clients global solutions to private markets investing. Moreover, the combination further cemented an existing advisory partnership between the US and European teams which began in 2014 in co-managing large and global SMAs.
Flexstone currently has over US$7.6 billion[1] in assets under management and advisory (“AUMA”) with 39[2] professionals across offices in New York, Paris, Geneva, and Singapore. Flexstone manages several discretionary and non-discretionary mandates ranging from less than €/$30 million to more than €/$1 billion in commitments as well as several proprietary funds including fund of funds, secondary and co-investment funds. Flexstone also designs and manages customized portfolios that are tailored to the unique investment objectives of each investor. SMAs account for 77% of the firm’s AUMA with the remaining balance of 23% is its proprietary funds.
Today, the spirit of Flexstone’s entrepreneurial roots is reflected in its independent thinking, independent investment decisions, and independent day to day management while benefiting from the support and guidance of one of the largest asset management firms in the world in areas such as risk management, compliance, and ESG.
[1] Assets under management and advisory as of 12/31/2019, including commitments for closed-end private placement funds, and sum of Net Asset Value and unfunded commitments otherwise.
[2] As of 3/3/2020, Full time employees only