Disposal

HG Capital Trust PLC 11 June 2007 The following is the text of a press release issued by HgCapital, which manages the investment portfolio of HgCapital Trust plc alongside those of other institutional clients. On completion of the sale of IRIS and CSG, HgCapital Trust plc, a listed investment trust giving investors the opportunity to participate in all of HgCapital's investments, will receive total consideration of approximately £27.8 million. The majority of this will be received in cash with approximately 11% of the consideration rolled over into a new investment vehicle for the combined businesses. The impact of the realisation on the net asset value of HgCapital Trust plc would be an increase of approximately 69p per share over the published May net asset value, which was issued on Friday 8th June 2007. HgCapital sells IRIS Software and Computer Software Group to Hellman & Friedman in a deal valued at £500 million London, 11th June 2007: HgCapital, the European sector-focused mid-market private equity investor, today announced the sale of IRIS Software ('IRIS'), the UK's leading provider of software to accountancy practices and their customers, and Computer Software Group ('CSG'), the UK's leading provider of software to legal practices and not-for-profit institutions, to investment funds affiliated with Hellman & Friedman, for an enterprise value of £500m. Closing is subject to obtaining certain regulatory clearances. HgCapital will continue as an active shareholder in the combined business. HgCapital's research-driven sector approach led it to acquire IRIS in July 2004 and CSG earlier this year. During its time of ownership, HgCapital has worked closely with both IRIS and CSG management teams to grow the businesses well ahead of general market growth rates both organically and through acquisition. Under HgCapital's ownership, IRIS has more than doubled employment, with staff numbers growing from 171 to 368, while a focus on direct sales, improving customer support and developing the product line has resulted in revenue growing from £20 million to £45 million and profits from £7.6 million to £18.6 million. The business has also doubled investment in product development, building on its position as the leader in its market. IRIS has completed four acquisitions since 2004 with the support of HgCapital. HgCapital and Hellman & Friedman recognised that merging these highly complementary businesses would create a powerful company, which is the largest provider of software applications to the UK accounting, legal and not-for-profit communities and one of the largest employers in the UK software mid-market IRIS and CSG are both recognised as the number one for customer service and product quality in their sectors, and the combined business offers the opportunity to provide additional products and services across the joint customer base. Since 2003 HgCapital has completed 5 original buyouts and 6 major bolt-on acquisitions in the SME software sector with a total deal value of £800 million (€1.2 billion). UBS Investment Bank acted as financial adviser to HgCapital and other shareholders. Nic Humphries, Head of TMT at HgCapital commented: 'The success of our investments in IRIS and CSG demonstrates the strength of HgCapital's research-led sector strategy. From 2003 we conducted substantial top-down research to identify the potential of subscription-based SME software business models as a core target area ahead of the market. Our ownership of IRIS then gave us a platform to identify complementary investment opportunities, and CSG was a perfect fit, offering a similar business model, a complementary customer base and a complementary management team. 'We are delighted to work with Hellman and Friedman to further grow the combined business which, under our ownership, has already established itself as the number one provider of software applications to the UK accounting, legal and not-for-profit communities'. -Ends- Contacts: HgCapital Nic Humphries Tel: +44 (0) 207 089 7888 Maitland Peter Ogden Tel: +44 (0) 207 379 5151 About HgCapital HgCapital is a private-equity investor in the European mid-market. We focus on investments with an enterprise value in the range of €75-500 million. Our business model combines sector specialisation with dedicated, pro-active support to our portfolio companies as well as the corresponding management expertise across all phases of the investment process. HgCapital manages more than € 2.7 billion for some of the world's leading institutional and private investors. Our goal is to achieve outstanding results for our investors, management team and intermediaries. For further details, see www.hgcapital.com About Hellman and Friedman Hellman & Friedman LLC is a global private equity investment firm with in London , New York City and San Francisco. Since its founding in 1984, the Firm has raised and managed approximately $16 billion of committed capital. The Firm's strategy is to invest in superior business franchises and to be a value-added partner to management in select industries including media, financial services, professional services, and information services. Representative investments include DoubleClick, Inc., the NASDAQ Stock Market, Inc. (NDAQ), Gartmore Investment Management plc, Catalina Marketing, Axel Springer AG (ASV GR), ProSieben Sat.1 AG (PSM GR), Formula One Holdings, Ltd, LPL Holdings, Arch Capital Group Limited (ACGL), Artisan Partners L.P., Mondrian Investment Partners, Ltd., AlixPartners, Young & Rubicam, Inc., and others. Other software and information services investments include: Activant Solutions Inc., Blackbaud, Inc, Intergraph Corporation, Kronos, Mitchell International, Inc, and Vertafore, Inc. For more information on Hellman & Friedman, visit www.hf.com. About IRIS IRIS provides accounting software, business & payroll software systems and services to more than 50,000 businesses from start ups to larger organisations and is the UK market leader in accountancy practice software with over 15,000 practices, from sole practitioners to large firms using IRIS solutions everyday. For further details, see www.iris.co.uk About Computer Software Group Computer Software Group (CSG) is the UK market leader in back-office software for the legal and not-for-profit sectors. The company has a customer base of over 3,000 legal practices and in addition blue-chip organisations including Alfred Dunhill, Zurich International, Paymaster General, Arriva, Grant Thornton, CBI, Tetra Pak, The Gap, L'Oreal, Cable & Wireless and Cancer Research UK. For further details, see www.computersoftware.com. This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
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