Waterland devotes significant resources to conducting a pro-active ‘top-down’ analysis of the market or industries that it identifies as having long-term growth potential or other economic fundamentals favourable to a consolidation strategy, such as an ageing population, outsourcing & digitalization, leisure & luxury and sustainability.

Ageing Population: as both the relative share and the absolute number of elderly people in the population will grow over the next few decades, there continues to be a growing market for specific services and products satisfying the needs and demands driven by these demographic changes.

Outsourcing & Digitalization: as companies and public organizations seek to drive efficiencies through digitalization of core processes and outsourcing of none-core processes, new opportunities are created for specialized service providers in a global context.

Leisure & Luxury: the leisure & luxury industry has enjoyed favourable long-term trends. As a growing portion of consumers seek a more convenience-oriented and luxurious lifestyle, there is an increased willingness to invest both time and money to improve the quality of their leisure time and standard of living.

Sustainability: companies, governments and consumers have become increasingly aware of the need to decrease pollution whilst reducing the consumption of natural resources and energy to ensure the longevity of the human eco support systems, human communities in general and the various systems on which they depend. This growing awareness increases the demand for various products and services that improve sustainability.

Successful entrepreneurship while pursuing a dynamic growth path typically involves intensive cooperation between management and Waterland. Waterland actively works together with the management of the portfolio company to develop a strategic growth plan for the business. This strategic growth plan – laying down the shared vision with regard to the execution of the buy-and-build strategy and organic growth – provides Waterland and the management team of the portfolio company with a clear framework for future cooperation. The combination of entrepreneurship, financial resources and added value will result in strong and synergetic teamwork.

Waterland targets initial investment opportunities in companies with their decision centre in the Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg), Germany, Austria, Switzerland, UK, Ireland, Scandinavia (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland) and Poland. Once an initial investment in a ‘platform company’ is made, Waterland will actively support the management with the execution of a pre-agreed growth strategy. This growth strategy often consists of a combination of organic and external growth. In the pursuit of a targeted ‘buy-and-build’ strategy, ‘add-on’ acquisitions are subsequently integrated into the platform company to expand the investment cluster to a larger size and stronger market position. Waterland can play a key role in helping companies achieve accelerated growth through consolidation by providing expansion capital, know-how and pro-active and hands-on strategic and operational support.

Waterland Private Equity Investments B.V. is registered as a fund manager in the register maintained by the Dutch regulator, the AFM (Autoriteit Financiële Markten).