Altimer Capital launched as a new alternative asset management firm targeting credit opportunities in the rapidly growing area of digital transformation. The new private credit and structured equity firm will offer financing solutions to support small and mid-sized companies that provide or deploy technology to drive business agility and resilience.
Altimer Capital is a women- and veteran-owned firm led by Natasha Fox and Patrick White. Fox and White are former colleagues at alternative asset manager American Capital (acquired by Ares Capital in 2017) who have again teamed up to leverage their two decades of successful investing experience and deep expertise in the software and technology industries that drive digital transformation. The firm will focus on the lower half of the middle market, where deal activity has more than doubled in the last five years, driving a growing need for tailored capital solutions. Demand for capital in this market is further amplified as established lenders raise increasingly large credit funds and shift their focus toward the upper middle market.
“We see an unprecedented credit opportunity in digital transformation that aligns with our extensive experience backing companies in technology and other data-driven industries,” Fox, managing partner of Altimer Capital, said. “Data and technology are transforming business models across industry sectors and creating a new universe of highly resilient, leverageable companies with fresh opportunities for growth and value creation.”
“At Altimer, we are building on the key drivers of our performance over the last two decades to generate attractive risk-adjusted returns, including deep sector knowledge, specialized sourcing networks and significant debt and equity investing experience,” White, managing partner of Altimer Capital, said. “As one of the few experienced, strategically focused credit providers in the lower half of the middle market, we see compelling opportunities to offer customized, flexible and comprehensive financing solutions that traditionally have only been available at the upper end of the market.”
Prior to launching Altimer Capital, Fox was a founding managing partner of Avante Capital Partners, where she successfully raised and managed two institutional funds and served on the firm’s Investment and management committees. She led an investment team that executed transactions in the software, business services and industrial sectors, creating portfolio value that drove the fund’s top-tier performance during her decade with the firm. Before co-founding Avante, Fox was principal and head of the San Francisco office of American Capital, where she and White worked closely together. Joining the firm shortly after inception, she helped grow the firm’s assets under management from $150 million to $20 billion. Fox has more than two decades of middle market leveraged finance experience, focusing on debt and equity financing solutions. During her career, Fox served on multiple boards of directors of portfolio companies and has been a committed supporter of women in business and private equity.
Before co-founding Altimer Capital, White was a managing director with Benefit Street Partners in San Francisco, where he led the firm’s credit investment activities in the Western U.S. Benefit Street Partners is a $37 billion credit manager and the primary private and liquid credit entity on Franklin Templeton’s alternative investments platform. Prior to Benefit Street, White co-led Monroe Capital’s software and technology practice. White has more than 20 years of experience in middle market finance, providing senior and junior debt and minority equity to businesses in software and technology and adjacent sectors. White has also held senior roles at American Capital, H.I.G. Capital and Wells Fargo Foothill. White is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, where he served in numerous combat leadership roles as an infantry officer in the U.S. Army.