Fort Washington increases Fund VIII target

Cinncinati-based Fort Washington Capital Partners has upped the target for its eighth fund of funds from $250m to $300m.

Fort Washington Capital Partners has raised the target for its eighth fund of funds from $250 million to $300 million, according to documents filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Fort Washington Private Equity Investors VIII launched last year and has collected $226 million. The capital is being raised through a main fund, which is targeting $271.4 million, and a parallel fund which has raised $28.6 million, the documents disclosed.

Limited partners in the fund include the Cincinnati Retirement System and The Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County Employees’ Benefit Trust Fund. The latter also committed to the firm’s prior fund, Fort Washington Private Equity Investors VII. The fund closed on $186 million, shy of its $250 million target in 2010, according to PEI’s Research and Analytics division.

The firm was unavailable to comment by press time.

Fort Washington makes primary fund investments and buys limited partner interests in venture capital, buyout and mezzanine funds. Between 10 percent and 15 percent of Fund VIII commitments will be dedicated to secondaries, a source familiar with the matter said. The firm targets secondary purchases of up to $20 million and is also active in fund recapitalisations, end of fund-life solutions and other non-traditional situations, according to its website.

Fort Washington was founded in 1990 as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cincinnati, Ohio-based Western & Southern Financial Group. The firm has been investing on the secondaries market since 2003.