Private equity investor ECI Partners has kicked off 2024 with three promotions – including two new partners.
Following a successful 2023 with several successful exits plus the final close of its largest ever fund, ECI 12, Daniel Bailey and Rich Pearce have been promoted from investment directors to partner.
ECI has also promoted Jin Ni Ooi to the role of investment manager following her support on the exit of 4Ways, a leading UK and European telediagnostic company, which resulted in a 2.7x return.
ECI has operated for over 45 years and manages funds of over £2 billion. It invests in growth businesses valued up to £300 million as either a majority or a minority investor.
Bailey joined the firm in 2018 and has played a key role in several new investments including co-leading the recent investment in ISMS.online. He has also worked closely with BCN Group, CSL, Peoplesafe and Content+Cloud.
He has also led 12 acquisitions across four portfolio companies, including the 2021 strategic acquisition of Sipcom, a Teams Voice and collaboration specialist, by Content+Cloud, contributing to ECI’s 4x return.
Pearce has been an investment director in ECI’s commercial team since 2019 and has been instrumental in recent investments into Ciphr, BCN and Commify.
He has also been the commercial team lead on four successful exits including MiQ, which generated a 6.1x return on exit in September 2022, and Tusker which generated a 6.3x return in February 2023.
“It’s fantastic to kick off the new year with three very well-deserved promotions, following a great end to 2023 with the announcement of the final close on our new fund, ECI 12,” said David Ewing, managing partner.
“We’re in a great place, starting the year with lots of available capital to deploy over the next three years, and a relatively small portfolio, so all of the ECI team are looking forward to a productive year working with exceptional management teams and helping them to unlock their growth potential.”