NewAlpha AM is expanding its activities beyond hedge funds with the successful raising of USD250 million in seed capital for a new long-only strategy.

The new Long-Only Equity strategy, a sub-fund of the French SICAV “Emergence”, which was created by Finance Innovation and with the support of the French Asset Management Association (AFG) and Paris Europlace, and is currently closed to new subscriptions, has attracted 12 institutional investors, several among the largest and most influential in France.

NewAlpha AM has selected two new asset managers Focus Asset Managers and Financière Arbevel, for their potential to deliver higher returns, and injected USD90 million in acceleration capital. In doing so, NewAlpha AM lowers entry barriers for institutional investors.
 
Founded by Frédéric Motte and Jérôme Archambeaud in 2011, Focus Asset Managers (AM) is specialised in value investing and concentrates specifically on the consumer goods, manufacturing and services sectors (all caps). Focus AM’s flagship fund manages USD150 million in AuM and has one of the best 10-year track-records in its category.
 
Jean Baptiste Delabare and Sébastien Lalevée, specialists in European and French equities respectively, took over Financière Arbevel in 2009. In just five years, the asset management firm has grown from EUR30 to EUR300 million in AuM. Its all-caps equity fund was awarded a Lipper Fund Award 2014 - French equities category, in recognition of its management over the last five-year period.
 
The remaining 160 million dollars in dry powder will be invested over the course of 2015.
 
Philippe Paquet, Managing Partner at NewAlpha AM, says: “For a number of years now, NewAlpha AM has been among the leading platforms in the hedge fund arena. We absorbed Next AM in 2013 and focused our efforts in 2014 on consolidating our business model. In 2015, we intend to build on our skill set and develop business globally. We are witnessing a clear demand for investment solutions at the crossroads of private equity, absolute return and long only investing. Going forward and to leverage our new capabilities, we are going to diversify into pure Private Equity and launch at least one fund in 2015.”