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Business Performance

The BVCA, in association with EY, publishes an annual report on the performance of portfolio companies, a group of large, private equity owned UK businesses that met defined criteria at the time of acquisition. Its publication is one of the steps adopted by the private equity industry following the publication of guidelines by Sir David Walker in 2008 to improve transparency and disclosure, under the oversight of the Private Equity Reporting Group (“PERG”).

The reports address many questions that various stakeholders may have on the impact of private equity ownership on large UK businesses, by presenting facts and benchmarks to provide answers. Each report is designed to be read stand-alone, summarising the accumulated data over previous years of reporting; it also contains comparisons to earlier year’s results and, for some measures, shows time series trends.

Annual report on the performance of portfolio companies, XV – February 2023

The 15th Annual Report covers 73 portfolio companies (as defined according to criteria set by the PERG) as at the 2021 financial reporting year (2020: 64), as well as a further 113 portfolio companies that have been owned and exited since 2005. The findings are based on aggregated information provided on the portfolio companies by the PE firms that own them —covering the entire period of private equity ownership. This year, data was received covering 61 portfolio companies and 2 have been given a first year exemption, a compliance rate of 86% (2020: 89%). On many measures of performance, the data on the current portfolio is combined with data from portfolio companies exited in 2021 and earlier, which provides over 100 data points, typically measuring performance over several years and a compliance rate of 90% (2020: 93%).

With a large number of portfolio companies, a high rate of compliance, and fourteen years of information, this report provides comprehensive and detailed information on the effect of private equity ownership on many measures of performance of an independently determined group of large UK businesses.

Read the report
Further information

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT THE BVCA

 +44 (0)20 7492 0400

 research@bvca.co.uk