SL Capital adds European IR professionals – updated

SL Capital Partners, the private equity arm of Edinburgh-based Standard Life Group, has hired two professionals to manage investor solutions in Europe, according to a statement.

Robert Kellermann has become head of DACH (German-speaking countries), and oversees the group’s growth in Austria, Germany and Switzerland. He joined the firm in September, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Previously, Kellermann was head of institutional clients at European asset rating agency Feri Trust Germany. He also worked as head of consultant relations for Germany and Switzerland at global investment manager Pioneer Investments KAG Munich.

SL has also hired Alan Coffey as an investment director focused primarily on continental Europe and the Nordic region. He previously spent ten years as a private equity specialist at Goldman Sachs.

SL plans to expand its team globally in the next year, particularly in its private equity, co-investment and secondary investment programmes, according to the statement.

“It is crucial that we support this growth with a highly effective distribution team who can provide clients with relevant solutions as they develop their own alternative investment strategies,” managing partner Roger Pim said in the statement.

Both Kellermann and Coffey will be involved in SL’s secondaries transactions, although neither will be fixed solely on the market.

SL closed its debut secondaries fund, Standard Life Capital Secondary Opportunity Fund I (SOF I) earlier this year on $190 million.

The fund is 30 percent deployed. In August it acquired a stake in Pantheon Europe V from the Royal Borough of Windsor & Maidenhead (RBWM). The stake was initially part of a portfolio RBWM tried to sell, but the pension did not receive a bid for the portfolio, so the Pantheon stake was sold by itself at a discount to net asset value.

SOF I is the firm’s first dedicated secondaries fund, but the firm has previously invested in secondaries through its fund of funds programme.

This story has been updated to rename SL’s secondaries fund to Secondary Opportunity Fund I, not Secondary Opportunity Fund II.