Park Street Nears $300M Target For Latest Fund Of Funds

Park Street Capital LLC, a Boston-based manager of both diversified and specialized funds of funds, has closed on $266.2 million in pledges for its latest fund, according to a regulatory filing.

The pool, Park Street Capital Private Equity Fund IX, has a target of $300 million. The firm’s prior fundraising effort, Private Equity Fund VIII, closed with $298.5 million in capital commitments in September 2007. The firm didn’t return calls seeking comment, although a review of its portfolio shows Park Street Capital to be a heavy backer of buyout firms, with commitments to such groups as Abry Partners, Bain Capital, First Reserve Corp., Madison Dearborn Partners, Thomas H. Lee Partners, and Vestar Capital Partners. A regulatory filing in early June reported capital commitments of $167.8 million for Fund IX.

Park Street Capital is the successor firm to Tucker Anthony Private Equity Group, which was founded in 1997 by Robert Segel through a joint venture with Tucker Anthony Sutro Inc. Park Street Capital became an independent firm in 2001 following the acquisition of Tucker Anthony by the Royal Bank of Canada in 2001. Segel is currently a managing director with Park Street Capital, which has a staff of 17.

In addition to its Boston headquarters, Park Street Capital has an office in San Francisco. The firm, according to its Web site, looks to deploy capital in “smaller, more frequent batches” than the typical fund of funds. It also strives to provide a significant level of transparency for its limited partners, going so far as to pre-specify a large number of likely investments prior to the completion of a fund’s formation.

Park Street Capital’s other managing directors include Dorr Begnal, who joined the firm in 1998 after seven years with Cambridge Associates’s Alternative Assets Group, and Kristine Dailey, who came on in 2001, also from the same group at Cambridge Associates.

Beyond private equity, Park Street Capital also sponsors vehicles for investment in natural resource assets, primarily timberland and oil and gas partnerships. Its most recent effort, Park Street Capital Natural Resources Fund III, closed in September 2006 with pledges totaling $323.9 million. The firm branched out in this direction in 2003, securing capital commitments of $80.7 million for an initial fund in April of that year.