Recruitment industry grandees John O’Sullivan and Jonathan Wright are launching an investment management and merger & acquisition (M&A) advisory business for firms that are planning an exit or capital event over the next one to five years.

Formally launching on 21 July, the seminar and advisory forum Elite Capital Partners (ECP) is “a natural extension” of the chief executive learning and development programme that has been delivered by the O’Sullivan-run Elite Leaders over a number of years, Wright told Recruiter.

“A key part of the ECP offering is our own Financial Conduct Authority-regulated network,” Wright went on to say. “We will typically invest from £500k up to £10m in … businesses typically making £500k to £2m in profits.

“We feel there is a gap in the market when it comes to these businesses raising buy-out or development capital. This may be seen as ‘pre-private equity’ and our institutional private equity partners are very excited about this. They like a number of the businesses that we are working with but they lack the specific sector expertise to help them progress at this stage.”

Wright said ECP’s development had been underway for about six months. In that time, ECP has completed the sale of Digital Gurus to the ReThink Group. A common link between Rethink and Digital Gurus was O’Sullivan, who has served on the boards of both companies and introduced the parties to each other in October 2014. 

Wright noted that a number of current Elite Leaders members will be migrating to the ECP or becoming part of the programme in addition to their involvement with Elite Leaders. “Of course,” he added, “membership of ECP is open to companies that are not members of Elite Leaders.”

Two deals are currently being worked by ECP, Wright told Recruiter. 

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