Gulf Capital has postponed plans to go public because of the “soft” equity markets but will plough ahead with as many as six acquisitions this year, the company’s chief executive said.
The Abu Dhabi-based private equity firm has raised Dh850 million of debt to help fund growth. It announced last month its tapping of the syndicated revolving facility arranged by two banks, Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and FGB.
“We realised with liquidity being plenty, and banks lending at very attractive rates, it was much more optimal for us to fund ourselves using debt rather than the equity market,” said Karim El Solh on the sidelines of a conference in Abu Dhabi.
Gulf Capital is not the only firm to put IPO plans on hold. Shareholders in the Abu Dhabi-based fleet manager Massar Solutions postponed its initial public offering last month, citing an insufficient number of applications for its Dh576m offering.
Gulf Capital, which manages Dh12 billion in private equity, credit and real estate, is considering deals in the consumer, energy, logistics and infrastructure sectors, he said.
“We’re looking aggressively on anything consumer-related,” said Mr Solh. “I think we expect between private equity and credit to do four to six transactions this year.”
The company is looking at consumer sectors such as health care, retail, food and education. “These [consumer] sectors are growing very nicely and are not affected by the oil prices,” said Mr Solh. “We are being opportunistic on the energy side. We are seeing interesting deals at lower valuations.”
Gulf Capital expects to use the Dh850m facility for its financial needs this year.
“As we grow, we may borrow more, for now we are fully funded both from debt and fund level,” said Mr Solh.
The new borrowing facility comes just after Gulf Capital closed its third and largest private equity fund, which at US$750m is the biggest in the region.
dalsaadi@thenational.ae
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