Corecap plans to tap into management buyouts, re-caps and private placements. A group of Gulf region investors have created an advisory firm to offer alternative-investment opportunities to wealthy private clients and institutions in the Middle East and North Africa.

The firm, to be called Corecap, aims to provide "prudently risk-managed investment portfolios" to institutions and wealthy private clients, according to a press release. It'll invest in management-led buyouts and buy-ins, consolidations, growth capital, re-capitalizations, equity and "mezzanine" private placements.

"The favorable regional macro-economic conditions resulting in GDP growth exceeding seven per cent per annum in most countries, large forex reserves, reasonable inflation, real and budget surpluses have encouraged international and regional investors to seek investments in the region," says Shaikh Mohammad Al Thani, chairman of the group and formerly Qatar's minister of Economics and Commerce.

Another Corecap

In addition to Shaikh Mohammad, Dubai-based Corecap's founders include Rohit Walia, CEO of Dubai-based private bank Sarasin-Alpen, and Corepartners, a Dubai-based investment-management firm.

North Africa might not be a rip-roaring high-net-worth market, but the oil-rich Middle East saw its population of U.S.-dollar millionaires grow by 9.8% to around 300,000 in 2005, according to most recent edition of Capgemini's World Wealth Report. Total assets held by Middle East-based millionaires increased 19.7% to about $1.2 trillion.

In contrast, North America and Asia Pacific saw respective millionaire-population growth rates of 6.9% (to 2.9 million) and 7.3% (to 2.4 million), and respective millionaire-held asset growth of 9.4% (to $10.2 trillion) and 8.0% (to $7.6 trillion) in 2005.

This new, Middle Eastern Corecap shouldn't be confused with Corecap Group, a London- and Vilnius, Lithuania-based private-equity consultancy. -FWR

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