Clarion Partners has taken its name back after completing a management buyout, with partner Lightyear Capital, from ING. At the AFIRE European Conference in Amsterdam on June 16, 2011, Real Estate Publishers had the opportunity to speak to William (Bill) Krauch, Managing Director of Clarion Partners, and ask him for a short explanation of the circumstances surrounding this remarkable operation.
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Bill Krauch.
Bill Krauch: "As a result of taking capital infusion from the Dutch government, ING was mandated to downsize the company. The first candidate for that was ING Real Estate Investment Management (REIM), which is a global platform with about 90 billion of assets under management. It was marketed last year and the winning bidder was CB Richard Ellis Investors to include Clarion Partners, but because of the overlap in the US we requested to buy ourselves back from ING REIM. So we did.
"We have a private equity partner by the name of Lightyear Capital. We put up about 20% of the equity, they put up 80% of the equity. There are no management changes we continue doing business as we always have. We sold 100% of our stock to ING in 1998 and last week we bought back 100% of that stock. We are very pleased and exited about the future.
"Stephen Furnary, one of the original founders of the firm in 1982, is the Chairman and CEO and will continue to be the CEO going forward."
As Managing Director Bill Krauch is responsible for the marketing client relations group and serves a lot of Clarion Partners domestic and international clients.
Clarion Partners was originally founded as Jones Lang Wootton Realty Advisors by Stephen Furnary and his partners in 1982, before they bought out the minority investor and renamed the firm Clarion Partners. Traditionally focused on core and core-plus/value-added strategies, Clarion Partners manages roughly a half dozen commingled funds and around 17 separate account relationships.
Source: Real Estate Publishers
"We have a private equity partner by the name of Lightyear Capital. We put up about 20% of the equity, they put up 80% of the equity. There are no management changes we continue doing business as we always have. We sold 100% of our stock to ING in 1998 and last week we bought back 100% of that stock. We are very pleased and exited about the future.
"Stephen Furnary, one of the original founders of the firm in 1982, is the Chairman and CEO and will continue to be the CEO going forward."
As Managing Director Bill Krauch is responsible for the marketing client relations group and serves a lot of Clarion Partners domestic and international clients.
Clarion Partners was originally founded as Jones Lang Wootton Realty Advisors by Stephen Furnary and his partners in 1982, before they bought out the minority investor and renamed the firm Clarion Partners. Traditionally focused on core and core-plus/value-added strategies, Clarion Partners manages roughly a half dozen commingled funds and around 17 separate account relationships.
Source: Real Estate Publishers
