As this week ends, the war in Ukraine grows deadlier, much to the horror of many of us who are witnessing it from afar. The economic ramifications continue to unfold as the U.S. and many of its allies push further to isolate Russia from much of the global economy. Many private-equity firms have been stewards of globalization for more than two decades and it remains to be seen what impact, if any, the current conflict will have on globalization in the long run. Conversations with dealmakers suggest that investment and fundraising activity is slowing on many fronts in the near term, although perhaps not as much as I would have feared.

In this morning’s news, Preeti Singh speaks to one of the co-founders of new firm FitzWalter Capital, which just wrapped up a $920 million debut fund, and also looks at how Vista Equity Partners will find out how much its buyout fund investors are willing to shrug off the tax scandal that touched the firm’s founder as it prepares for an initial closing of its next flagship fund. Finally, our Wall Street Journal colleague Juliet Chung reports on the shutdown of hedge fund Aravt Global LLC, a casualty of the selloff of growth stocks.

Read on for more details and have a good weekend…

FitzWalter Capital, started in 2020 by a group that included former executives with Australian investment bank Macquarie Group Ltd., raised almost double the capital it had targeted for its first investment fund in less than nine months. The firm closed the pool, FitzWalter Capital Partners I LP, last year with $920 million, about 84% more than its $500 million target, raising much of it through virtual meetings because of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to Ben Brazil, one of FitzWalter’s co-founders. WSJ Pro Private Equity’s Preeti Singh spoke to Mr. Brazil about how he plans to invest the new fund.

New York hedge-fund firm Aravt Global LLC is shutting after sustaining significant losses recently, a sign of the severe pain the selloff in growth stocks is inflicting, The Wall Street Journal’s Juliet Chung reports. Aravt’s hedge fund lost 8.5% in 2021 and was down by double digits this year through February—in line with the tech-laden Nasdaq Composite’s 12% loss including dividends for the period, said people familiar with the firm. Founded by former Ziff Brothers Investments principal Yen Liow, Aravt focused on what he called “horses,” companies that would reliably post above-average growth.

As Vista Equity Partners looks to raise its biggest fund ever, its ability to achieve that goal will demonstrate just how well the firm has been able to separate itself from the personal tax scandal of its founder and chief executive, Robert Smith. So far several investors seem to be looking past Mr. Smith’s issues.

Read more in Singh's Take. 

Cinven has agreed to buy the pest-control unit of Bayer AG for $2.6 billion, Georgi Kantchev reports for The Wall Street Journal. The unit is part of Bayer’s environmental science business that had around €1 billion, equivalent to $1.1 billion, in sales in 2021. Cinven said that it would look to increase innovation and speed up growth of the business. In 2021, the division had around 800 employees and sales in more than 100 countries.

SoftBank Group Corp.’s Vision Fund 2 led a $240 million investment in single-family rental home investment company Roofstock Inc. in a deal that values the business at $1.94 billion, according to a news release. Participants also included Bain Capital’s venture arm,  SVB Capital and a clutch of venture investment firms. Roofstock’s digital system offers a way to invest in U.S. rental homes.

Madison Dearborn Partners has expanded its equity investment in Amynta Group, an insurance services provider the Chicago-based private-equity firm helped form back in 2018. Madison Dearborn is buying the remaining stake held in the company by AmTrust Financial Services, Inc., according to a press release. Amynta’s management team will retain a minority stake in the company, the release stated.

KKR & Co. has led a €90 million, the equivalent of $99.7 million, growth financing for +Simple, a European digital insurance brokerage company. Other investors that backed the financing round include new backer Tikehau Capital and existing backers Eurazeo and Speedinvest as well as the company’s founders, according to a press release. KKR is financing the deal out of its KKR Next Generation Technology Growth Fund II, a $2.2 billion fund closed in 2020.

Sixth Street is leading a growth investment alongside Lion Tree merchant bank in private-equity backed customer experience technology provider Emplifi Inc., valuing the company at more than $1 billion, according to a press release. Audax Private Equity, which has backed the company since at least 2019, will remain an investor, the press release stated.

InTandem Capital Partners, a healthcare services focused private-equity firm, said it has combined MPP Infusion Centers and ID Consultants to create a new Denver-based infusion company called Vivo Infusion, according to a press release.

KKR & Co. has acquired five logistics properties in Spain, in the Barcelona and Madrid areas, through its Mirastar investment vehicle in Europe.

China-focused FountainVest Partners plans to open some 600 Dairy Queen, or DQ, restaurants across China, working with Berkshire Hathaway Inc.-owned International Dairy Queen Inc. in Minneapolis. FountainVest and its franchise ownership vehicle, CFB Group, plan to open the first 100 of the new stores this year, according to a news release. Hong Kong-based FountainVest recently acquired CFB Group, a Chinese company that already owns more than 900 DQ restaurants.

Accel-KKR led a $60 million investment in online marketing systems provider Birdeye Inc. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company works with locally focused businesses to develop connections with customers, including responding to queries and paying bills.

Kaulig Capital has acquired garage door parts maker Torsion Group Corp. from MCM Capital Partners in Beachwood, Ohio. Hudson, Ohio-based Kaulig said Torsion supplies garage-door manufacturers, installers, dealers and end-users with parts including windows and sales from a factory in Evansville, Ind.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s asset management arm has agreed to provide $50 million in financing to gambling machine operator Eagle Global, a women and minority-owned state lottery licensee, to provide coin-operated amusement machines within the state. The Norcross, Ga.-based company plans to combine two similar businesses with the financing and may acquire others in the future, according to a news release.

Our add-on deal interactive tool allows you to sort and analyze volumes of add-on deal data compiled by WSJ Pro. View more.

The British government ratcheted up pressure on Kremlin-linked businesspeople, sanctioning a handful of Russian oligarchs, including Roman Abramovich, the billionaire owner of British soccer club Chelsea FC, Max Colchester writes for the Journal. It was the first time any Western government has moved on Mr. Abramovich. His trophy assets, including Chelsea, high-end property in London and a mega yacht, have helped turn him into one of the highest-profile oligarchs now facing scrutiny from officials in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

A handful of U.K. and U.S.-based law firms, including Clifford Chance LLP, Allen & Overy LLP, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP and Winston & Strawn LLP, announced they would close offices and wind down operations in Russia as a result of that country’s invasion of Ukraine, Richard Vanderford writes for the Journal.

A blank-check company whose leaders include the chief executive of distressed investment specialist MatlinPatterson Global Advisers has called off its plan to combine with a medical device company based in Israel, regulatory filings show. MedTech Acquisition Corp., a special purpose acquisition company that raised $250 million in December 2020 through an initial public offering of shares, said last August that it would merge with Memic Innovative Surgery Ltd. and bring it public in a deal that was expected to give the Tel Aviv-based company an equity value of more than $1 billion. The companies said they mutually agreed to drop the deal, without citing particular reasons. The SPAC’s leadership includes MatlinPatterson co-founder David Matlin as chief financial officer and said it plans to continue its hunt for an acquisition target.

A blank-check company backed by Latin America-focused Patria Investments Ltd. and led by its senior executives raised $200 million through an initial public offering of shares, down from the $250 million it initially sought to raise from its IPO, securities filings show. Patria Latin American Opportunity Acquisition Corp., the special-purpose acquisition company, registered for the IPO about a year ago. Patria managing partner Ricardo Scavazza is the SPAC’s chairman and Patria Partner José Augusto Gonçalves de Araújo Teixeira is its chief executive, a regulatory filing shows. The Nasdaq-listed company joins more than 600 other SPACs that have raised cash and are looking for deals, according to SPAC Research data.

Audax Private Equity said it has sold portfolio company Smart Care Equipment Solutions to Zone Climate Services, a portfolio company of Chicago-based Wind Point Partners. Audax initially backed the provider of commercial kitchen equipment maintenance services in 2017.

Arctic Glacier, a packaged ice company backed by Carlyle Group Inc. since 2017, has sold its Icesurance leasing division to Easy Ice, a portfolio company of Freeman Spogli & Co.

Crestline Investors Inc. said in an emailed press release that it has raised a total of $3.6 billion across three new credit funds. The firm has collected $1.6 billion for Crestline Opportunity Fund IV to back underserved or capital constrained middle-market companies, real estate lending and specialty finance programs across North America and Europe. It has also raised $1 billion each for Crestline Specialty Lending Fund III, which is tagged for senior secured, unitranche and second-lien debt for midmarket companies, and Crestline Specialty Lending Fund III, which focuses on providing capital for private equity, real estate, and infrastructure funds and other private asset vehicles, the release stated.

Rhône Group, a midmarket firm that backs companies with headquarters and operations in Europe and North America, has rounded up a total of at least $2 billion for its latest private equity fund, according to regulatory filings. The firm collected the euros equivalent of at least $639 million for Rhone Partners VI LP and the euros equivalent of at least $1.45 billion for Rhone Offshore Partners VI LP, two separate filings indicate.

Austin, Texas-based Peak Rock Capital is seeking $500 million for Peak Rock Capital Credit Fund III LP and related parallel vehicles, according to a regulatory filing. Peak Rock backs credit investments across a broad range of industries and structures in corporate credit and commercial real estate. The firm can invest as little as $1 million to more than $200 million per deal but its target hold size ranges between $10 million and $50 million, according to the firm’s website.

One Rock Capital Partners said it has hired Dr. Kevin Lang as an operating partner focusing on helping portfolio companies with manufacturing and distribution in the food and beverage industry, according to a press release. Dr. Lang previously founded Soundwatch Consulting, a firm that develops formulations designed to increase the shelf life of bakery snack foods, the release stated.

Healthcare-focused Avista Capital Partners said Neil Ferguson has joined the firm as a strategic executive at the firm. Mr. Neil most recently served as chief business officer at Syneos Health, a company that offers outsourced clinical development, commercialization and consulting services

Vance Street Capital in Los Angeles has promoted Nic Janneck, Steve Sandbo and Rustey Emmet to partner and Matt Shemirani to vice president. The firm also promoted Nick Lindholm to senior associate.

Credit-focused Lakemore Partners named Arno van den Heiligenberg as a managing director and head of business development Europe, a newly created role. He was most recently global co-head of investment fund sales for UBS Wealth Management, according to a news release.

Infrastructure and real assets firm Stonepeak said it would incorporate compensation linked to performance related to environment social and governance goals into its new core infrastructure investment strategy, joining a handful of firms that link a portion of their fund compensation to ESG metrics.

Increasing venture-capital investment in gene-editing technology is fueling a rush to secure intellectual property in a sector that promises to spur advances across several areas of biotechnology, Brian Gormley reports for WSJ Pro Venture Capital. Technology known as Crispr enables researchers to make precise changes, or edits, to an organism’s genetic code, which could lead to therapies for genetic diseases, cancer and other conditions. Because of its broad commercial potential, gene-editing technology has been surrounded by intellectual-property disputes for several years.

Eurazeo SE finished last year with about €31 billion, or roughly $34.33 billion, in assets under management, or 42% more than it had a year earlier, according to the Paris-based private-equity firm. Eurazeo said it raised about €5.2 billion in new investment capital. Fee-related earnings rose about 30% to €93 million, according to the publicly traded firm.

Golding Capital Partners ended last year with about €2 billion, equivalent to about $2.22 billion, more in investment capital that it had at the end of the previous year, pushing the firm’s total managed assets to €12 billion. The Munich-based asset manager said it brought in capital from 28 new investors last year.

Investment distribution and financial technology company iCapital said it has agreed to acquire the alternative investment feeder fund platform of Stifel Financial Corp, which supports the distribution of a slate of hedge fund strategies, according to a press release.

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Ted Bunker; Laura Cooper; Chris Cumming; Luis Garcia; Laura Kreutzer; Preeti Singh; Chitra Vemuri.

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