Pantheon to Raise $600M Secondary Fund

Maintaining its already strong interest in secondary deals, Pantheon Ventures is raising its next dedicated secondary fund with a goal of $600 million, Private Equity Week has learned.

The announcement follows the firm’s first stand-along secondary fund, Pantheon Global Secondary Fund, which closed in 2000 with $418 million.

While Pantheon does not release the names of its limited partners, the London Pensions Fund Authority (LPFA) said it allocated $68 million to Pantheon with a mandate to invest globally.

Pantheon’s LPs include corporate and public pension plans, endowments, foundations, and family offices. Thomson Venture Economics (publisher of PE Week) lists Pacific Mutual Life Insurance Co. as one of Pantheon’s LPs.

Earlier this year, Pantheon announced the final closing of its new fund-of-funds, Pantheon USA Fund V (PUSA V), with $313 million, exceeding its initial target of $200 million.

The fund will co-invest in U.S.-based private equity funds over the next three years. PUSA V will mostly likely reach a 20% allocation for secondaries, which is a significant departure from past PUSA funds.

Pantheon International Participations, the firm’s UK-based investment arm, announced earlier this month that it had recovered from losses incurred during the 2002-2003 investment year.

Pantheon reported investing $202 million in new private equity investments for the year ended June 30 and $150 million of that went into 58 secondary investments.

It distributed more than $68 million to investors and reported that 60% of its distributions were generated by secondary purchase assets.

Last year, Pantheon’s most significant secondary deal was the purchase of Quantum Technology Ventures from Quantum Corp. Pantheon renamed the fund QTV Capital. The portfolio includes companies in the enterprise software, storage, and security sectors.

The firm did not return calls for comment. Pantheon Ventures has offices in London, Brussels, Hong Kong and San Francisco and manages about $6.7 billion in assets. Earlier this year, the firm closed Pantheon Europe Fund III with $543 million.

Email Matthew Sheahan