Buyout practitioners active in Germany are tired of being asked when their market will finally make that sudden great leap forward that has been predicted time and again over the past decade. ‘Predicted by whom?’ they shrug, implying that much of the commentary published in recent years on the German market's growth potential has been so much nonsense, circulated by poorly informed outsiders.
How to keep a promise never made
More than enough has been written about the broken promise that was Germany's private equity market. The problem is: who made that promise? Not the local practitioners who continue to build out the franchise of the asset class not so much in spite, but because, of the tough times the economy is experiencing. Philip Borel visited Germany to find out who's doing what and why.
