GI Partners Up To $1.8B For Fund III

GI Partners, which looks to make control-oriented equity investments in the $25 million to $250 million range, has raised about $1.8 billion toward a $2.5 billion target for its third fund, a source familiar with the matter told Buyouts. The shop expects to hold its next close in the first quarter, the source said.

The firm is fairly diversified in its approach, investing in buyouts of both healthy and distressed health care services, hospitality, leisure and retail, logistics, media, entertainment, financial services, technology, telecom services and infrastructure, according to its Web site. GI Partners has two headquarters, in Menlo Park, Calif., and London, and invests both in the United States and Western Europe.

The $1.45 billion GI Partners Fund II is fully invested, according to our source. The firm has already completed a deal from Fund III, acquiring Care Aspirations, a provider of mental health services in the United Kingdom, in late August. Care Aspirations, established in 1986, operates specialist residential homes, redevelopment homes and hospital facilities. GI Partners is in the exclusivity phase on four additional deals in the United States, our source said.

The firm wasn’t available for comment.

Rick Magnuson founded GI Partners in 2000. Prior to that, he was deputy partner with Nomura Group’s Principal Finance Group in London. Members of the original group that formed GI Partners have all invested together since 1994, according to the firm’s Web site.

GI Partners’s portfolio includes Acentic GmbH, a German provider of entertainment and Internet services for hotels; Digital Realty Trust, a publicly-traded real estate investment trust based in San Francisco; and Orchid Pubs, a London pub management company.