The Carlyle Group Wins Two Asia Private Equity Awards from The Asset: Best Asian Private Equity Firm and Best Domestic M&A Transaction

Hong Kong – Global private equity firm The Carlyle Group has been named Asia’s Best Private Equity Firm by The Asset magazine in its Triple-A Asset Asian Awards 2009. The Asset also named Carlyle’s share swap transaction between portfolio company kbro and Taiwan Mobile Company as the region’s best domestic M&A transaction.

In naming Carlyle as Asia’s Best Private Equity Firm, The Asset noted that it made 10 investments in 2009 with equity commitment valued at about US$890 million across its Asian buyout, growth and real estate funds, while successfully exiting from four real estate transactions and returning US$297.2 million of capital to investors. These investments include Natural Beauty Bio-Technology, Yashili (infant formula producer), Nantong Rainbow Heavy Industry (now renamed Jiangsu Rainbow Heavy Industries), China Agritech and iTour in Greater China, Broadleaf (auto software provider) and Chimney (restaurant chain) in Japan, and three real estate investments in Asia. They were all successfully concluded despite the global financial crisis that has dampened investment activities globally.

In September, Carlyle Asia Partners agreed to exchange its holdings in kbro, one of Taiwan’s largest cable operators, for a 15.5% stake in Taiwan Mobile, a Taiwanese telecommunications operator. The transaction will create the largest pay-TV service provider in Taiwan, with more than 1.5 million subscribers, and will further support the convergence of mobile and cable in Taiwan’s telecommunications sector. In naming the kbro-Taiwan Mobile share swap transaction as Asia’s Best Domestic M&A transaction, The Asset noted that ”the combined business creates a lot of synergies, including reduced capital expenditure costs due to economies of scale, optimal use of fixed line infrastructure and backhaul, lower customer service costs and improved financing costs.”

The Asset also noted Carlyle’s ability to raise new investment capital even in challenging circumstances. Carlyle Asia Growth Group’s fourth fund, for instance, raised US$1.04 billion in 14 months from April 2008 to June 2009, despite a difficult market environment.

David M. Rubenstein, Co-Founder and Managing Director of The Carlyle Group, welcomed the two awards: “These awards reflect more than a decade of hard work by our more than one hundred investment professionals in Asia, but we hope the best is yet to come for our investors and the local companies in which we invest.”

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