Ripplewood is an American private equity

Private equity

Private equity, in finance, is an asset class consisting of equity securities in operating companies that are not publicly traded on a stock exchange....

 firm based in New York, New York that focuses on leveraged buyout

Leveraged buyout

A leveraged buyout occurs when an investor, typically financial sponsor, acquires a controlling interest in a company's equity and where a significant percentage of the purchase price is financed through leverage...

s, late stage venture

Venture capital

Venture capital is financial capital provided to early-stage, high-potential, high risk, growth startup companies. The venture capital fund makes money by owning equity in the companies it invests in, which usually have a novel technology or business model in high technology industries, such as...

, growth capital

Growth capital

Growth capital is a type of private equity investment, most often a minority investment, in relatively mature companies that are looking for capital to expand or restructure operations, enter new markets or finance a significant acquisition without a change of control of the business.Companies...

, management buyout

Management buyout

A management buyout is a form of acquisition where a company's existing managers acquire a large part or all of the company.- Overview :Management buyouts are similar in all major legal aspects to any other acquisition of a company...

s, leveraged recapitalization

Leveraged recapitalization

In corporate finance, a leveraged recapitalization is a change of the capital structure of a company, a substitution of equity for debt —e.g. by issuing bonds to raise money, and using that money to buy the company's stock or to pay dividends...

s and other illiquid investments.

Ripplewood was founded by its current CEO, Tim Collins

Tim Collins (financier)

Timothy C. Collins, born 1956, is the founder, senior managing director, and chief executive officer of Ripplewood Holdings LLC. He also sits on the Board of Directors of Citigroup....

. The company's main interests range from telecommunications to banking to entertainment. The firm manages more than $10 billion in capital.

Investments

• Direct Holdings Worldwide (parent of Time-Life direct marketer)
• SAFT Power Systems (now renamed as AEG Power Solutions (acquired from Alcatel
  Alcatel
  Alcatel Mobile Phones is a brand of mobile handsets. It was established in 2004 as a joint venture between Alcatel-Lucent of France and TCL Communication of China....
  
  )
• Honsel International Technologies
• Kraton Polymers
  Kraton (polymer)
  Kraton is the trade name given to a number of high performance elastomers manufactured by Kraton Polymers , and used as synthetic replacements for rubber. Kraton polymers offers many of the properties of natural rubber, such as flexibility, high traction, and sealing abilities, but with increased...
  
  
• Interstate Bakeries Corporation
  Interstate Bakeries Corporation
  Hostess Brands, Inc. is the largest wholesale baker and distributor of fresh bakery products in the United States, and is the owner of the Hostess, Wonder Bread, Nature's Pride, Dolly Madison, Butternut Breads, and Drake's brands. For many years it was based at 12 East Armour Boulevard, Kansas...
  
  
• Little Chef
  Little Chef
  Little Chef is a chain of roadside restaurants in the United Kingdom, founded in 1958 and owned by the UK private equity group RCapital. Little Chef's previous owners were The People's Restaurant Group Ltd., a company belonging to British catering entrepreneurs Simon Heath and Lawrence Wosskow,...
  
  

Previous Investments

• Shinsei Bank
  Shinsei Bank
  is a Japanese commercial bank headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo.-History:Shinsei Bank is the successor of a trust bank, the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, which had a government monopoly on the issuance of many long-term debt securities...
  
  
• Japan Telecom
  Japan Telecom
  SOFTBANK TELECOM Corp. Japanese: , previously as , is a Japanese telephone company of the SoftBank group. It is a load in JNR in the origin. It provides services to businesses and consumers in Japan. It provides long-distance telephone service, international call service, and direct connection...
  
  
• Columbia Music Entertainment
  Columbia Music Entertainment
  is a Japanese record label founded in 1910 as . It affiliated itself with the Columbia Graphophone Company of the United Kingdom and adopted the standard UK Columbia trademarks in 1931. The company changed its name to Nippon Columbia Co., Ltd. in 1946. It used the Nippon Columbia name until...
  
  
• Denon
  Denon
  is a Japanese electronics company that was involved in the early stages of development of digital audio technology, while specializing in the manufacture of high-fidelity professional and consumer audio equipment. For many decades, Denon was a brand name of Nippon-Columbia, including the Nippon...
  
  
• Lillian Vernon
  Lillian Vernon
  Lillian Vernon Corporation is an American catalog merchant and online retailer that sells household, children's and fashion accessory products. In business since 1951 Lillian Vernon Corporation is an American catalog merchant and online retailer that sells household, children's and fashion...
  
  
• The Reader's Digest Association
  The Reader's Digest Association
  The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. is a global media and direct marketing company, best known for its flagship publication founded in 1922, Reader's Digest...
  
   (the company filed for bankruptcy in August 2009 and Ripplewood lost its entire investment)
• Edwards Fine Foods (sold to Schwan Food Company
  Schwan Food Company
  The Schwan Food Company is a multibillion-dollar, privately owned company with 17,000 employees in the United States. Based in Marshall, Minnesota, the company sells frozen foods from home-delivery trucks, in grocery-store freezers, by mail and to the food service industry...
  
  in 2001)