29 January 2016

Oakley Capital Investments Limited ("OCIL" or the "Company")

Trading Update for the 12 months ended 31 December 2015

·      NAV per share (unaudited) expected to be in the range of £1.98 - £2.00 representing an increase of approximately 9% on June 2015

·      Aggregate increase in fair value across both Fund portfolios of 31% (since June 2015)

·      Oakley Funds have deployed €148m during 2015

·      £77m invested by the Company in the period through its continuing co-investment programme facilitated by the £130m Placing in March 2015

·      Successful exits returned €63m to the Company. Fund IRR generated of 64%

·      Commitment of €250m to Fund III

Oakley Capital Investments Limited (AIM: OCL, "OCIL"), the AIM-listed company established to provide investors with access to the investment strategy being pursued by Oakley Capital Private Equity L.P. ("Fund I") and its successor fund, Oakley Capital Private Equity II ("Fund II") (together the "Funds"), today announces a trading update for the 12 months ended 31 December 2015.

The Company, through its investment in Fund I, has an indirect interest in each of Fund I's portfolio companies representing 65.5% of Fund I's total commitments; and through its investment in Fund II, an indirect interest in each of Fund II's portfolio companies representing 38.1% of Fund II's total commitments.

Oakley Capital Limited, OCIL's Investment Adviser, estimates that the Company's net asset value, which is subject to the completion of the 31 December 2015 audit of the Funds, and the Company, will be in the range of £378 million to £382 million, equating to a net asset value ("NAV") per share of between £1.98 to £2.00 (30 June 2015: £1.82). The overall increase in fair value across both Fund portfolios on a like-for-like basis is 31%, driven by strong portfolio company performances in Fund II. As at 31st December 2015, we expect the gross realised and unrealised returns to be 37% and 53% IRR and 2.2x and 1.6x money multiple for Fund I and Fund II's portfolio respectively. The OCIL net asset value is made up of cash, the investment in the Funds, co-investments, short-term bridging finance for the Funds and loans provided to a number of the portfolio companies.

Peter Dubens, Director, commented: 

"The underlying performance of the Funds' portfolio companies has been strong over the period, reflected in the 31% growth in the fair value of their investment portfolios over the last six months, and driven by substantial EBITDA growth. The Funds had two exits in the period generating a combined gross IRR of 64%, providing good returns for our Investors.

We continue to see a dynamic pipeline of attractive investment opportunities which should enable the Funds and the Company to maintain their deployment record."

Key Highlights

·      Fund I

o  Fund I is fully invested and at the year end has just three portfolio companies remaining.

o  The performance of this 2007 vintage fund has been extremely strong with a realised IRR of 46% and gross money multiple of 3.5x. 

o  In June 2015, Fund I disposed its controlling stake in Verivox to ProSieben, generating a gross money multiple of 14.5x and an IRR of 68%.  Total proceeds of €56.3m were distributed to Fund investors, including €36.8m to the Company.

·      Fund II

o  Fund II is now 73% invested across nine portfolio companies.

o  The portfolio of Fund II, which closed in December 2014 and hence is still relatively young, has seen an increase in its value to an IRR of 53% and gross money multiple of 1.6x (realised and unrealised). 

o  Fund II has made a total of nine investments, of which one has already been realised.  The following new commitments were made during 2015:

-     Damovo II Sarl, a provider of enterprise information communication technology (ICT) services and solutions, which will seek to replicate the success of Daisy through a European roll-up strategy led by founder of Daisy, Matthew Riley.

-     Parship GmbH, one of Europe's earliest online dating businesses and the leading online matchmaker in Germany.  Parship has a strong record of growth, which is continuing. Furthermore, shortly after the acquisition, the second player in the market, Elite Partner, was also acquired in an off market transaction which consolidates Parship's market position.

-     Daisy Group Holding Limited ("Daisy") is the leading UK supplier of unified business communications and IT services and solutions. The Company is familiar with Daisy, having received considerable value when Fund I exited its 13.6% holding in Daisy in late 2014. The acquisition of Phoenix by Daisy provided an opportunity for Oakley to participate in its next strategic phase as a minority investor alongside the founder and chairman, Matthew Riley.

-     Verivox, a market leader in Germany for online price comparison.  Fund II had the opportunity to acquire a minority stake alongside ProSieben when Fund I exited, and therefore benefit from the synergies that will be achieved as well as the ongoing growth in this market.  The Fund has a put option after five years.

Fund II has also benefitted from an exit and refinancing to return proceeds to fund investors:

-     intergenia, the Fund's first investment, was sold to HEG Co. GmbH ("Host Europe"), the market leader, representing a gross money multiple of 1.4x and IRR of 47% for Fund II in under 12 months. Proceeds of €20.4m were distributed to the Company.

-     facile, the leading Italian price comparison website acquired in 2013, was able to refinance its debt during the summer thanks to strong trading and cash generation, returning 20% of invested capital to the Fund, including €5.2m to OCIL. 

·      Co-investments:

During the year, the Company made co-investments and loans alongside the funds of £77million providing an efficient means of utilising the assets of OCIL in a prudent way. For the period since inception the IRR on OCIL's loans and cash has been in excess of 5% per annum.

·      Commitment to Fund III  

Following the new investments over the past 12 months, Fund II is now almost fully invested so OCIL has agreed to make, in line with its investing policy, a commitment of €250 million to Oakley Capital III, a successor fund.

Fund III will execute the same proven strategy as Oakley Capital Private Equity's previous Funds I and II.

·      Capital Markets Day

OCIL will host a Capital Markets Day for institutional investors and analysts on 25^th April 2016. A series of presentations will be given by the senior management team of the Company's Investment Adviser, Oakley Capital Limited, and by CEOs of several of the Limited Partnership's portfolio companies. No new material information will be disclosed.

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For further information please contact:

Oakley Capital Investments Limited

+44 20 7766 6900

Peter Dubens

Liberum Capital Limited (Broker & Nominated Adviser)

+44 20 3100 2000

Steve Pearce / Tom Fyson

FTI Consulting LLP

+44 20 3727 1000

Edward Bridges / Emily Desmier

About Oakley Capital Investments Limited ("OCL")

Oakley Capital Investments Limited is a Bermudan based company listed on AIM. OCL seeks to provide investors with long term capital appreciation through its investment in Oakley Capital Private Equity L.P. and Oakley Capital Private Equity II and through co-investment opportunities.