Fairfax Africa Holdings Corporation, an investment holding company traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange has entered into a merger agreement with Helios Holdings Limited, a leading Africa focused private investment firm, for the combination of their complementary businesses on one unified platform – Helios Fairfax Partners Corporation (HFP)
Founded in 2004 by Tope Lawani and Babatunde Soyoye, Helios Investment Partners is the largest Africa-focused private investment firm, with a record that spans creating start-ups to providing expanding companies with growth capital and expertise. It is based in London, UK.
Fairfax Africa was founded in late-2016 by FAIRFAX FINANCIAL HOLDINGS LIMITED and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada
Tope Lawani and Babatunde Soyoye, the co-founders and Managing Partners of Helios Investment Partners LLP will be appointed as co-chief
executive officers of HFP while the current CEO of Fairfax Africa, Michael Wilkerson, will become the Executive Vice Chairman
This Transaction creates a leading Africa-focused alternative investment manager with the strength and stability of an investment holding company and the enhanced cashflow and liquidity profiles of an alternative asset manager. HFP will continue to be publicly-listed and will represent an attractive investment vehicle offering exposure to high-quality investments in African markets.
Tope Lawani, co-founder and Managing Partner of Helios Investment Partners LLP said: “We are proud to be partnering with Fairfax Financial and Prem Watsa on this next step of Helios’ development. The combination leverages our mutual strengths and enables us to provide public market investors with unique access to a differentiated set of investment opportunities on the African continent, as we have been doing for our partners in our private funds. This will strengthen our ability to deliver on our mission to generate globally competitive investment returns and create positive socioeconomic development outcomes for Africa by building profitable, value-creating and socially responsible businesses.”
Prem Watsa, Chairman and CEO of Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited added: “We are excited to partner with Tope and Babatunde in establishing Helios Fairfax Partners. They have an outstanding track record in investing in Africa over the past 15 years. Our cultures are very similar and Tope and Babatunde, with our support, aim to establish the pre-eminent investment vehicle for Africa in the years to come. We believe this partnership will be good for Africa, the shareholders of Fairfax Africa and Helios and the employees of both organizations.”
Michael Wilkerson, Chief Executive Officer of Fairfax Africa, said: “This combination creates the pre-eminent pan-African investment platform, bringing together the complementary strengths of our respective expertise, cultures and people, in an attractive permanent capital vehicle. We are very pleased to partner with Tope, Babatunde and the entire Helios team, and look forward to working together to build sustainable value for our shareholders over time.”
