Vista crushes target with $1B Foundation Partners II fund

While private equity firms often take 12 to 18 months to raise a new fund, Vista Equity already held a first close of $530 million for Vista Foundation Partners II over the summer.

Vista Equity Partners filed a Form D for the fund on May 14 but it did not disclose any details of money raised or a target size at that time.

Among limited partners for the fund, the New Jersey Division of Investment has committed $100 million to Vista Foundation Fund II.

The Garden State has made several commitments to Vista funds in recent years and reported a collective gross cash multiple of 4.1x and a gross internal rate of return (IRR) of 50 percent since Vista launched under founder Robert Smith, chairman and CEO, in 2000, according to a document from the pension fund released over the summer. Vista’s net multiple for all New Jersey investments, realized and unrealized, is 1.8x with a net IRR of 29 percent, the state pension fund reported.

Vista has already made at least one acquisition out of Vista Foundation Fund II through its deal to combine Saxotech and Digital Technology International to form NewsCycle Solutions, a specialist in content management, digital advertising, circulation, and audience relationship management for more than 3,000 customers in the media publishing business. Vista orchestrated the simultaneous acquisitions of both DTI and Saxotech to create NewsCycle in a deal announced July 22.

Meanwhile, the firm’s flagship Vista Equity Partners Fund IV has been bulking up its transactions. The $3.5 billion fund, which closed in 2012, earlier announced plans to take event management software firm Active Network Inc private in a deal valued at $904 million.

A spokesman for Vista declined to comment.

California Public Employees’ Retirement System committed $10 million to the Vista Foundation Fund I in 2009 and earned a 1.4x return as of  March 31, according to the pension fund’s web site.  

CalPERS invests in Vista funds through its Capital Link Fund, which is managed by Credit Suisse as a customized fund investment group.

Vista Equity Partners took the gold medal for the top-performing domestic buyout fund, according to the Aug. 13, 2012 issue of Buyouts.

(Chris Witkowsky, editor of sister publication peHub.com, contributed to this report.)