Overview
Our flagship corporate opportunities strategy pursues investments in growth-oriented middle market companies in North America and Europe. Our senior investment professionals average over 21 years of experience investing in, advising, underwriting and restructuring leveraged companies.
We seek to invest in high-quality middle market companies in our core industries - Healthcare, Services, Industrials and Consumer - where we can utilize our extensive growth-oriented investing experience, proprietary Value Creation System and our ability to flex into distressed to seek to generate consistent returns across market environments.
We seek to generate attractive returns by identifying and investing in middle market inefficiencies. We will also seek to generate predictable alpha during our investment period by utilizing (i) our experience of systematically and sustainably helping build great businesses and (ii) our proprietary Value Creation System to help our companies drive long-term revenue and EBITDA CAGRs in excess of industry averages and market expectations. Utilizing these capabilities, we seek to align with management on a company's controllable growth levers (e.g., M&A, new unit openings, new products/services) and invest behind those levers to drive enduring, long-term growth.
Corporate Opportunities
We focus on identifying and investing in middle market inefficiencies in high-quality, growth-oriented companies where we can seek control or significant influence through two principal transaction types: (i) growth buyouts and (ii) distressed.
Our growth buyout-focused approach, with the ability to flex into distressed investing during periods of heightened market volatility, allows us to quickly adapt to changing market environments and continue sourcing and executing on a broad funnel of deal flow irrespective of market conditions. We pursue a relative value investment philosophy focused on identifying opportunities in an effort to maximize attractive net returns, as opposed to limiting opportunities to a specific transaction type or structure.
We believe that this strategy is differentiated amongst our peers and widens our universe of potential investment opportunities beyond that of many other buyout firms.
Targeted Investments
We seek compelling investments in leading companies that typically have not maximized their growth potential. We invest our capital in a variety of structures, depending on the needs of a company or a particular transaction. We are equally comfortable investing in both majority and shared-control situations and our Private Equity Group has developed extensive experience in working through the issues that can surround shared-control investing. As a result, this flexibility helps us to develop a creative transaction that meets the needs of a company's various stakeholders.
Targeted Investment Characteristics
- Differentiated or disruptive business model
- Multiple potential controllable growth levers
- Experienced leadership characterized by strong processes and culture
- Strong customer base
Value Proposition
For Management Teams
We work in partnership with our portfolio company management teams to employ Ares' Value Creation System, typically over a five to seven-year investment horizon. By properly capitalizing a company at the time of our investment, management can refocus its efforts toward compounding EBITDA growth and maximizing free cash flow. The chart below illustrates the prototypical actions and objectives of this process, which are customized for any given particular situation.
Corporate Opportunities Action Plan Strives to Accomplish
Stage 1
Rapid Onboarding & Alignment
Establish alignment and partnership
Build early momentum and quick wins
Quickly address high-impact talent acquisition
Stage 2
Mobilization
Seek to unlock long-term growth
Prioritize key value drivers and ensure talent is aligned to value agenda
Build high impact board and align discussions to growth plans
Stage 3
Execution Support
Provide customized support to enhance execution
Deliver growth plan with sustainable long-term value creation
Support key talent to value priorities
Stage 4
Maximize "Escape Velocity"
Update mobilization plans
Invest in and execute on key value drivers; continued people investments
Position company for exit and explore exit alternatives
For Investors
The combination of our differentiated strategy and broad resources of Ares Management widens our universe of potential investment opportunities and allows us to deploy capital across various market environments while remaining highly selective. Many of these situations originate from proprietary channels and require us to generate creative and complex structuring solutions.
Portfolio of Investments
We pursue investments in growth-oriented middle market companies where we can drive long-term growth to generate attractive returns. We seek to invest in the most attractive relative value opportunities and build a diversified portfolio with uncorrelated risks. The table below lists our current platform investments.
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