Glendower, BlackRock back healthcare GP-led

A group that includes some of the secondaries market’s best known names has backed a mid-market healthcare deal.

Los Angeles-based Pacific Avenue Capital Partners moved Emerald Textiles into a continuation fund backed by Glendower Capital, BlackRock Private Equity Partners, DWS Private Equity, Allstate Investments and CH Investment Partners, among other investors, according to a statement.

The deal is worth $200 million including follow-on capital and the refinancing of the business’s credit facilities. UBS advised on the equity portion of the transaction.

It is not clear which investors participated on a secondary basis. Santa Monica-based Ocean Avenue Capital Partners was among the limited partners to sell its stake, the statement said.

Emerald Textiles provides linen management services to hospitals, clinics and other healthcare facilities in the western US. It operates six processing facilities and serves more than 750 customers across California, Nevada and Utah.

The deal gives Emerald the equity capital to “aggressively pursue its organic growth strategy” and make acquisitions, it said in the statement. Emerald was created in 2017 by the merger of two healthcare linen businesses and made add-on acquisitions in 2018 and 2019, according to Pacific Avenue’s website.

This is the second healthcare GP-led deal that Glendower has backed in the space of two months. In July Secondaries Investor reported that it was lead investor on a €700 million single-asset process centered on care home business DomusVi, an ICG portfolio company.

Transactions focused on a single company accounted for a quarter of all secondaries deals by volume in the first half of this year, equivalent to $12 billion, according to data from Evercore. This compares with $14 billion for full-year 2020.