The 'before and after' transformation

How Inflexion operate and what their latest deal tells us about private equity

“They ran a tight ship and you were expected to follow their rules and guidelines in order to fulfill the ‘before and after’ transformation,” I was told.

My source could have been talking about the experience of taking investment from a high performance oriented private equity investor.

Private equity, afterall, is cloaked in mystery. The results can be spectacular, remarkable, transformative, but many of its extensive operations are conducted in relative secrecy. 

Take Inflexion, for example, from its small and well appointed Manchester office in King Street, it monitors a significant presence in the North West economy, having backed 15 companies and invested about £800 million in the region.

We will hear more about Inflexion, and its investment strategy, but the tight ship being described above is instead Ultimate Performance Fitness, the Manchester headquartered global fitness and training business formed by Nick Mitchell, which has this week leaked out the news that it has been acquired, and is now controlled by Inflexion from its £400m Enterprise V fund, which typically makes investments in the £10m to £75m range.

There wasn’t supposed to be any press on the deal, but someone in the process tipped off Mark Kleinman at Sky News and TheBusinessDesk.com covered the local angle.