Impact manager Summa working with UBS on single-asset continuation fund

Summa Equity, manager of the largest impact fund dedicated to Europe, is exploring a single-asset continuation fund process as the market for impact secondaries heats up.

The Stockholm-headquartered manager is looking to move Norwegian biowaste company Norsk Gjenvinning Group into a separate vehicle, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The asset is housed in Summa’s debut fund, which closed in 2017.

UBS is pre-marketing the transaction, with a formal process anticipated to launch later this month, one of the sources said.

Summa’s debut fund, the SKr4.7 billion ($452.6 million; €417.6 million) Summa Equity Fund I, initially acquired the company from private equity house Altor Equity Partners, which invests across the Nordic and DACH regions.

The company has delivered between a 2x and 3x multiple-on-invested-capital over Summa’s five-year ownership, the sources said.

Both Summa and UBS did not respond to requests for comment.

This year could be a boom period for impact secondaries, with investors expecting impact funds and assets to become a larger slice of a growing secondaries pie. North Sky Capital, Arcano Asset Management and Stafford Capital Partners are among firms with active impact-secondaries businesses.

Summa Equity has established itself as a dominant pure-play impact manager: its flagship third vehicle, which closed on €2.3 billion in January 2022 after four months in market, is the largest Europe-focused impact fund to date, according to PEI data.

In its 2021 impact report, Summa described the company as a critical part of the Nordic infrastructure and an enabler for the Nordic circular economy.

“Through its activities, NG ensures recycling of materials and recovery of energy in waste, which conserves resources and reduces GHG emissions, in addition to reducing waste through reuse and waste prevention.”

Summa Equity was set up in 2016 by five partners – Reynir Indahl and Johannes Lien, formerly at Altor; Tommi Unkuri and Jenny Keisu, formerly at Nordic Capital; and Christian Melby, formerly at Norwegian firm Norvestor Equity. Keisu and Lien have since departed the firm, according to their LinkedIn profiles.