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From:

"Dan Primack"

Name:

Dan Primack

Email Address:

Dan_Primack@fortune.chtah.com

Subject:

Term Sheet -- Tuesday, November 30

Date:

30-11-2010 18:45:32
Message

Fortune Finance Street Sweep Term Sheet Economics Tech Wall Street Washington

The Term Sheet by Dan Primack

Tuesday -- November 30, 2010
Email Dan | Follow Dan on Twitter | Subscribe

Random Ramblings
Several years ago, J and I began something called BBQ chicken nacho night. Not a regular happening, but
an occasional treat to celebrate special stay-at-home occasions (like the Lost finale). The star was cooked
up at our local Bugaboo Creek steakhouse.
I know what youre probably thinking: How unsophisticated. I dont care. It was the epitome of yumminess.
So imagine my surprise the other night, when I called in an order (first night home alone with Emma, sans
mother-in-law) and was told that the location was closed. A bit more Google searching uncovered that the
parent company had closed over half of its 86 locations -- which include Bugaboo, Charlie Browns and
Office-branded restaurants and laid off over 2,000 employees without warning. Moreover, it seems that
the company is owned by walking dead private equity firm Trimaran Capital Partners.
Trimaran bought Charlie Browns in 2005 from Castle Harlan for around $150 million (50/50 debt/equity
split). The company later acquired Bugaboo for around $28 million, which may partially have been financed
via an $11.5 million equity injection from Trimaran.
I say may have been partially financed, because Trimaran so far is declining to comment on the situation.
A Trimaran managing director yesterday cited firm policy, and said that someone else might choose to
discuss the matter at a later date.

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Sorry Trimaran, but that isnt good enough. When you fire 2,000 workers without warning in a lousy labor
market, to boot then you should at least explain why it happened. How did you manage to oversee the
partial collapse of two restaurant franchises that you once thought were worth nearly $200 million? Was it
simply macro trends, or did you not do enough to make the brands more relevant.
I spoke this morning with a private equity investor who had looked a few times at Charlie Browns/Bugaboo,
who passed because he said the topline trends were in the wrong direction a statement at odds with
Charlie Brown's CEO, who reportedly told Fox Biz News this past spring that sales had improved (I couldn't
find the vid to confirm).
Private equity firms serve their limited partners, but they also have a responsibility to company employees.
Its a trust of sorts. Not necessarily to maintain employment, but to give some reason for handing out pink
slips. So far, Trimaran is violating that trust.
*** Help: Im planning to change the name of Pre-Marketing, the daily links post I do each morning over at
Fortune.com. All suggestions are welcome.
*** Just asking: Apollo Management's hiring of Marc Spilker as president is yet another move in its march
toward IPO. If the offering is successful, how long until TPG Capital files its own S-1?
*** Yesterday I spent some time on the phone with Ted Schlein of Kleiner Perkins, following the firms
hiring of star tech analyst Mary Meeker. A couple quick takeaways:

1. Expect that Meeker will focus more on later-stage investments (i.e., revenue-generating
companies), rather than beating the bushes for business plans and a dream.
2. Meeker and Kleiner have danced on numerous occasions over the past decade, but the timing
wasnt right until now. Not only from Kleiners perspective, but also from Meekers (who was
worried about what would happen to her group at Morgan Stanley).

3. Schlein pushed back hard against the idea that Kleiner is late to the digital/social game, and using
things like Meekers hiring to catch up. The phrase second inning kept coming up. Ill delve into
that a bit more on the blog later today.

5 things to read @Fortune.com

Pre-Marketing, including how Comcast could break the web, WikiLeaks takes on Wall Street, the
street value of Facebook app developers, TARP keeps getting cheaper and how Twilight's Bella
and Edward humiliated a real-life real estate tycoon..

Listicle: A tour of New York's "Silicon Beach"

Nin-Hai Tseng: How Ireland went from riches to rags
Ken Otterbourg: Alcoa and the great North Carolina power grab
Dan Primack: What happens to Bank of Ireland's U.S. leveraged finance biz?

The Big Deal

Heartland Robotics Inc., a Cambridge, Mass.-based developer of robots for manufacturing environments,
has raised $20 million in Series B funding. Highland Capital Partners led the round, and was joined by
Sigma Partners and return backers Charles River Ventures and Bezos Expeditions.
It's the big deal because... well because it's robots (and it's a bunch of cash). Sure we'd all prefer that
Heartland was creating Rosie-like devices that could serve us drinks, but this will do for now...

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VC Deals
OPower, an Arlington, Va.-based provider of energy efficiency and smart grid software, has raised $50
million in new VC funding. Accel Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers co-led the round, and
were joined by return backer New Enterprise Associates. www.opower.com
Abiquo, a Redwood City, Calif.-based provider of enterprise cloud management software, has raised
around $10 million in Series B funding. Balderton Capital led the round, and was joined by return backers
Nauta Capital and Eurecan. www.abiquo.com
Transactis, a New York-based provider of electronic billing solutions, has raised $7 million in Series B
funding led by StarVest Partners. www.transactis.com
Payvment, a San Francisco-based social commerce platform on Facebook, has raised $6 million in Series
B funding. Sierra Ventures led the round, and was joined by return backer BlueRun Ventures.
www.payvment.com
Totsy, a New York-based private sale site focused on mothers of young children, has raised $5 million in
Series A funding from DFJ Gotham and Rho Ventures. www.totsy.com
RingRevenue, a Santa Barbara, Calif.-based provider of call performance marketing, has raised $4 million
in new VC funding from return backers GRP Partners and Rincon Venture Partners. The company
previously raised $3.5 million. www.ringrevenue.com
PowerCloud Systems has been spun out as an independent company by Palo Alto Research Center Inc.
(PARC), with Walden Venture Capital and Javelin Venture Partners joining PARC as company investors.
PowerCloud Systems has been incubated at PARC since 2008, and provides cloud-managed networking
solutions to small and medium-sized businesses. www.powercloudsystems.com
Travel Ad Network, a New York-based online travel media company, has acquired the assets of
TravelMuse, a travel planning website. No financial terms were disclosed. Travel Ad Network has raised
over $30 million in VC funding from StarVest Partners, Rho Ventures and Village Ventures.
www.traveladnetwork.com

Private Equity Deals

Arsenal Capital Partners has acquired Royal Adhesives & Sealants LLC from Quad-C Management,
for an undisclosed amount. RAS is a South Bend, Ind.-based maker adhesives and sealants.
www.arsenalcapital.com
Ares Management and Freeman Spogli & Co. have acquired Floor and Decor Outlets of America Inc.
from an investor consortium that included Najeti Ventures, Saugatuck Capital and TWJ Capital. No
financial terms were disclosed. Floor and Dcor is an Atlantabased specialty retailer of hard-surface
flooring and accessories. www.flooranddecoroutlets.com
Core Energy AS has secured a $150 million equity line from energy-focused private equity firm
HitecVision. Core plans to acquire interests in mature oil and gas fields on the Norwegian Continental
Shelf. www.hitecvision.com

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Excelitas Technologies Corp., a portfolio company of Veritas Capital Fund, has acquired the Illumination
and Detection Solutions business of PerkinElmer Inc. (NYSE: PKI). The deal was valued at $500 million in
cash. www.perkinelmer.com
Investindustrial has agreed to sell Italmatch Chemicals to Mandarin Capital Partners and the
Malacalza Group for an undisclosed amount. Italmatch Chemicals is an Italy-based company focused on
phosphorus derivatives. www.italmatch.it
JC Flowers & Co. is leading a group that may buy a 15% stake in Brazilian bank Banco BTG Pactual for
around $1.5 billion, according to Reuters.
Seagate Technology (Nasdaq: STX) announced that it has terminated discussions with private equity
firms regarding a going private transaction, principally because it determined that the indications of the
valuation range were not in the best interest of the company and its shareholders. The hard-drive maker
reportedly had received an offer from TPG Capital and KKR, with Bain Capital also expressing interest.
Seagate also announced that it will repurchase up to $2 billion of its ordinary stock. www.seagate.com
Shell Oil Co. has put its South Texas gas fields up for sale, according to the Wall Street Journal. The deal
could generate upwards of $1 billion for Shell, which is the U.S. arm of Royal Dutch Shell PLC.
www.shell.us
Sun Capital Partners has completed its acquisition of V&D and La Place from Maxeda Retail Group, for
an undisclosed amount. V&D is a Dutch department store chain, while La Place is a Dutch restaurant chain
with some locations within V&D stores. www.suncappart.com
Trilantic Capital Partners soon will announce two new deals, according to the FT. The first is an
acquisition of Italian slot machine operator Gamenet, while the other is a minority investment in Portuguese
educational publisher Leya. No financial terms for either deal were reported. www.trilanticpartners.com

PE-backed IPOs
Rank Group has agreed to acquire UCI International, an Evansville, Ind.-based provider of replacement
parts for light and heavy-duty vehicles, from The Carlyle Group. The deal is valued at $375 million, plus
the assumption of around $605 million in net debt. In related news, UCI has pulled registration for a $200
million IPO. Had that offering priced at the high end of its $14-$16 per share range, UCI would have begun
trading with a market cap of approximately $671 million. www.ucinc.com

Exits
Aurora Capital Group has sold the parent company of Gilbreth Packaging Solutions Inc. to Cenveo
Inc. (NYSE: CVO), for an undisclosed amount. Gilbreth is a Croydon, Penn.-based maker of full-body
shrink sleeves, tamper-evident neck bands and medical & electronic tubing. www.gilbrethusa.com

Other Deals
ABB (NYSE:ABB) has agreed to acquire industrial motor company Baldor Electric Co.
(NYSE:BEZ), for approximately $4.2 billion in cash (including assumption of $1.1 billion in debt).

Firms & Funds

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Advent Venture Partners has raised $120 million for its first-ever fund focused exclusively on life sciences
investing. The London-based firm said the vehicle will be managed by general partners Shahzad Malik and
Raj Parekh. www.adventventures.com
Centerbridge Partners has secured approximately $1.15 billion in capital commitments for its second
fund, according to a regulatory filing. The New York-based firm reportedly is seeking a total of $3.75 billion.
Park Hill Group is serving as placement agent. www.centerbridgepartners.com

Sheridan Production Partners has raised $1.8 billion in capital commitments for its second
fund, which will acquire onshore producing oil and gas properties in the United States. SPP is a
Houston-based group formed in 2006 by Warburg Pincus. www.sheridanproduction.com

Moving In, Up and On

Marc Spilker has joined Apollo Global Management as president, a new position responsible for running
the firms day-to-day operations. He also will serve on Apollos executive committee. Spilker previously
spent 20 years at Goldman Sachs, including as co-head of investment management. www.agm.com
Actis has promoted four directors to the position of partner. They are: Sanjiv Aggarwal (Mumbai), Shomik
Mukherjee (Mumbai), Tao Sun (Beijing) and Dong Zhong (Beijing). www.act.is
Bill Byun has stepped down as managing director of Samsung Ventures, as first reported by Dow Jones.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Byun is now running something called 7 Capital. In related news,
Samsung Ventures has hired former Intel exec Jay Chong. www.samsungventures.com
Cheryl Liew has joined executive search firm CTPartners as a Silicon Valley-based principal in the firms
financial services practice. She previously was VP of investor relations with Crescent Point, an Asia-based
special situations fund. www.ctnet.com
Gordon Pollock Jr. and Dudley Baker have joined the investment banking group of Avondale Partners
as an executive managing director and vice president, respectively. Pollock focuses on business services
and education, and previously was a managing director with Morgan Joseph. Baker previously was a vice
president with Morgan Joseph. www.avondalepartnersllc.com

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