Pacific Equity Partners’ gun SAF team seek exclusivity on new $1b deal
Private equity firm Pacific Equity Partners is in late-stage talks to buy lifestyle communities business Serenitas, put up for sale by investment bank Goldman Sachs.
Serenitas owns and operates lifestyle communities around the country. Nic Walker
PEP’s been in-and-around the business since late last year, but Street Talk understands Australia’s largest buyout firm is back on the hook. Rothschild and Herbert Smith Freehills are on the tools for PEP, with both sides working towards a signed deal.
The sale price is expected to be about $1 billion, sources said.
The acquisition is expected to be housed in PEP’s second Secure Assets Fund, for which PEP’s SAF dealmakers, led by Andrew Charlier, recently locked in $1.4 billion. That raise, which initially targeted $1 billion, capitalised on the tearaway success of PEP’s first secure assets fund, thanks to dream deal smart metres play Intellihub.
While SAF I was big on energy and utilities – think, community energy services business WINConnect and remote power outfit Zenith Energy – its second iteration is expected to cast the net wider and also look at transport and logistics, waste, data and telecommunications, and social and agricultural infrastructure.
The fund seeks companies with protected cashflows, operating step-change and strategic repositioning potential and targets a gross internal rate of return between 14-16 per cent. Charlier works alongside fellow managing director Evan Hattersley and director Paul Foster.
Serenitas was founded in 2017 and is a joint venture between Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC and local mid-market private equity firm Tasman Capital, led by seasoned campaigner Rob Nichols.
The firm owns a portfolio of 25 lifestyle communities around the
Read more on afr.com
