Emerging Capital Partners

Emerging Capital Partners

Company type	Private
Industry	Private Equity
Founded	2000
Headquarters	Washington D.C.
Key people	Tom Gibian, Chairman Hurley Doddy, Co-CEO Vincent Le Guennou, Co-CEO
Products	Private equity funds, Growth capital
Website	www.ecpinvestments.com

Emerging Capital Partners (ECP) is an international private equity firm focused on investing across the African continent. The firm is the first private equity group to raise over US$1.2 billion to invest exclusively in African companies. The firm's investors are uncorrelated to the U.S. and other global economies. By the third quarter of 2008, the firm had invested in approximately 50 companies, exited from about 20, and achieved an average return of three times its initial investments.

While the African continent is generally overlooked in terms of investment opportunities, ECP has seen a high demand for capital in African markets, where the demand for investment far outweighs the supply. In addition, the past several years have seen positive shifts, such as government movement to open-market philosophies and improved macro-economic fundamentals. ECP has found that these factors are enabling Africa to become a vibrant marketplace with a defined opportunity set for private equity investment.

History

ECP initially started operating in 2000, as part of EMP Global. Under EMP, ECP gained responsibility of Framlington Investment Management’s two Africa funds, the West Africa Growth Fund and the Central Africa Growth Fund. In 2005, ECP was spun out on its own under the leadership of Thomas Gibian, Hurley Doddy and Vincent Le Guennou.

Since the spin out, ECP has gained the reputation as one of the leading private equity firms focused on the African market. Limited partners in its funds include global institutional investors, such as pension funds and endowments, as well as global institutions like the European Investment Bank, African Development Bank and the International Finance Corporation.

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the firm has African offices in Nigeria, Côte d’Ivoire, South Africa, Tunisia and Cameroon. It has used this local presence to set up the network and social infrastructure needed to facilitate the collection and interpretation of business information on the continent. This infrastructure, Gibian has said, is necessary to investing successfully in Africa, and is one of the main reasons ECP is successful.

Funds

The firm’s first independent fund – a US $407 million multi-purpose fund named the AIG African Infrastructure Fund – was sponsored by AIG and the International Finance Corporation. The fund’s advisory board included several notable members, such as Nelson Mandela and former African National Congress general secretary Cyril Ramaphosa.

The firm’s second major pan-African fund, ECP Africa Fund II, closed in May 2007 with US$523 million. At the time, it marked the largest private equity fund ever raised for investments across the African continent. Africa Fund II was established to seek majority or minority positions in companies through equity, quasi-equity and convertible debt instruments, with a focus on telecommunications, natural resources, financial services, agribusiness, transportation and utility businesses.

Notable Investments

ECP has secured profitable investments across a variety of industries including utilities infrastructure, agribusiness, financial services, natural resources, telecommunications and transportation. These include:

• Blue Financial Services, a non-deposit taking micro lender serving 10 countries in sub-Saharan Africa

• Continental Reinsurance Plc, Nigeria’s largest reinsurance company which completed a successful listing on the Nigerian Stock Exchange

• Starcomms, a leading Nigerian mobile telecommunications operator

• Société Internationale de Plantations d'Hévéas (NYSE Euronext: SIPH), Africa's leading natural rubber producer and exporter

External links

• Emerging Capital Partners home page