Philip Coletto
Partner, Corporate & Financial Services
Philip Coletto is a partner in the Corporate & Financial Services Department and Private Equity Group in London. His practice focuses on advising private equity sponsors and other institutional investors on a range of complex, cross-border investments, including leveraged buy outs, minority investments, carve-outs, special situation transactions and growth and venture capital. Philip has represented, amongst others, Insight Partners, Davidson Kempner, Blantyre Capital, Genstar Capital, Aquiline Capital Partners, Freshstream, IK Partners, Bluewater, Ardian and FFL Partners.
Philip was ranked #7 in MergerLinks’ recently published listing of the Top Mid Cap M&A Lawyers in the UK for 2023, and was also ranked #1 for the same category in 2022. He is recognised by The Legal 500 UK (2024) for high value private equity transactions, where clients have noted that he "has extremely strong negotiation and matter management skills" and "excellent attention to detail," and by Best Lawyers (2024) for private equity law and mergers and acquisitions law.
Experience
- IK Partners on its acquisition of a minority stake in A-SAFE, a leading manufacturer and distributor of industrial polymer safety barrier systems (2024)
- Insight Partners on its investment in connection with the merger of Comply365 and Vistair Limited (2024)
- Insight Partners in connection with its Series B investment (2021) and a subsequent $42 million investment in Sedna, a communication platform for the maritime industry (2023)
- Insight Partners in its Series B investment in Sylvera, a UK carbon data provider (2023)
- Searchlight Capital Partners on its recommended final cash offer for the entire share capital of London-listed Gresham House plc, a specialist alternative asset manager (2023)
- Apex Group Ltd., a Genstar Capital portfolio company, in the acquisition of real estate service provider Retransform (2023)
- Insight Partners in its investment in Kabal (2023)
- STARK Group on the acquisition of Saint-Gobain Building Distribution Ltd (2023)
- Davidson Kempner on the sale of Nature Energy, a natural gas distributor, to Shell for approx. $2 billion (€ 1.9 billion) (2022)
- Insight Partners on its minority investment in UK fintech company Banked (2022)
- Avenue, a leading U.S. brokerage for Brazilian investors, in its sale of an initial 35% stake, and subsequent controlling stake, to Itaú Unibanco (2022)
- Insight Partners on the acquisition by its portfolio company AMCS of Quentic (2022)
- Insight Partners on its minority investment, together with Five Arrows, in Kpler (2022)
- Insight Partners on its Series C investment in financial markets software company Genesis Global Technology Limited (2022)
- Ardian and its portfolio company AD Education in the acquisition of the European operations of SAE Institute, a leader in audiovisual and creative media higher education (2022)
- Insight Partners on its Series D investment in Qonto, a France-based online bank for businesses (2022)
- Bluewater on its acquisition of IMServ Europe Limited from Schneider Electric (2021)
- Insight Partners on its Series B investment in Beauty Pie, a luxury beauty product buyers' club (2021)
- Insight Partners and other sellers on the sale of Duco Technology Limited to Nordic Capital (2021)
- Apex Group Ltd. and Genstar Capital in the significant minority investment by TA Associates in Apex, a Genstar portfolio company (2021)
- Insight Partners in connection with a $75 million Series C funding round in Immersive Labs, a cyber-security training platform (2021)
- Freshstream on the sale of leading UK holiday resort business Away Resorts to CVC Capital Partners (2021)
- Genstar Capital and its portfolio company Apex Group in its acquisition of BRL Trust Investimentos, a leading independent fund administrator in Brazil (2021)
- Genstar Capital and its portfolio company Apex Group on the acquisition and financing of Tzur Capital Management Ltd. (2021)
- Davidson Kempner in its investment in Start Campus (2021)
- Insightful Science, a portfolio company of Insight Partners, in its acquisition of Dotmatics, a scientific informatics software and services company (2021)
- Insight Partners in connection with a $50 million funding round in Pollinate (2021)
- IK Investment Partners, through its IK Small Cap I Fund, on the sale of its stake in Third Bridge to Astorg (2021)
- Insight Partners in its investment in Exclaimer Group (2020)
- Genstar Capital and its portfolio company Apex Group in its acquisition of Banco Modal’s Alternative Fund Administration business in Brazil (MAF) (2020)
- Bregal Freshstream in its acquisition of UK holiday park operator Away Resorts (2019)
- FFL Partners, through its portfolio group Laurel Solutions, in the cross-border acquisition of Servelec Technologies (2019)
- Genstar Capital and its portfolio company Apex Group in the acquisition of the corporate and private clients business of Link Asset Services, a division of the Australian listed Link Group (2019)
- Excellence Logging, a portfolio company of Blue Water Energy, in its acquisition of Weatherford International’s surface data logging business (2018)
- Genstar Capital and its portfolio company Apex Fund Services in the acquisition of Ipes from Silverfleet Capital (2018)
- Warburg Pincus in its investment in Avaloq, an international fintech company and leader in integrated and comprehensive banking solutions (2017)
- Bregal Freshstream in its investment in Intergas (2017)
- Davidson Kempner Capital Management LP (as a key shareholder) in connection with the NJJ-led consortium’s acquisition of eircom (2017)
- Insight Venture Partners in its Series D investment in Darktrace (2017)
Credentials
Education
University of Bristol Law School, LPC, 2007 University of Bristol Law School, Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL), 2006 University of Nottingham, B.A., 2005