| David Hopkins, Carbon International
Impax Asset Management, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Impax Group plc, has announced further details of its growing portfolio. Following the disposal last year of its investment in Cellex Power Products Inc, Impax now holds investments in seven companies covering a broad range of environmental activities. The portfolio includes three recent additions, New Earth Solutions, Nordic Windpower and Emergya Wind Technologies (EWT). Whilst New Earth is helping to tackle the growing challenge of diverting waste from landfill, Nordic and EWT are bringing established wind turbine designs into the commercial market. Impax has invested nearly £12m across these three companies. Previous smaller investments have been made in Ensyn, a Canadian biomass pyrolysis technology; Pelamis Wave Power, the Edinburgh-based wave energy developer; Sterecycle, a UK autoclave waste treatment developer; and RecovCo, which developed a technology for improving aluminium recycling yields and then purchased Affimet, the largest French aluminium recycling business, from Alcan. Nigel Taunt, Impax's Director of VC Investments, said: "Impax invests in later stage venture capital, fitting comfortably alongside our portfolios of environmental companies operating in public markets. Impax is one of the UK's largest quoted environmental investment managers with over £1bn of funds under management or advisory mandates
They need to be candidates for flotation, a qualitative judgement that means we believe they could IPO within 2 years. We are now looking to commit at least £3m into each new investment, leaving headroom for follow-on support when required." Impax is one of the UK's largest quoted environmental investment managers with over £1bn of funds under management or advisory mandates. The two flagship funds, Impax Environmental Markets plc and Impax Environmental Markets (Ireland), have around £600m invested largely in quoted environmental stocks worldwide, with 10% (c.£60m) available for later stage venture capital. If private company investments achieve a listing in due course, they move seamlessly into the quoted portfolio. "We see other venture capital investors as potential partners, not as competitors" said Jonathan Fogg, Investment Manager, VC Investments. "We hope that others will welcome us as co-investors because Impax can help build an investor book and groom companies for public markets. We're long-term investors, so an IPO can be a staging post along the way, not an automatic end game". "We have a strong pipeline of potential investments and are always keen to meet both new companies in the environmental sector and potential co-investors. This is a fast growing area and the opportunities to create value are looking excellent," he added.
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