Sentinel Capital Partners, a private equity firm that invests in promising lower middle market companies, announced the simultaneous first and final closings of Sentinel Capital Partners VI, L.P. at $2.15 billion and Sentinel Junior Capital I, L.P. at $460 million. Total capital raised for the two new funds was $2.6 billion.

"We are delighted by this fundraising outcome and grateful for the strong show of support from our existing investors and several new prominent investors," said David S. Lobel, founder and Managing Partner of Sentinel. "We are also very pleased to launch our inaugural junior capital fund, which will serve the financing needs of our lower middle market companies."

Sentinel will continue the same investment strategy it has employed and refined in previous funds—partnering with talented management teams to acquire companies with up to $65 million in EBITDA and solid business fundamentals, in industries where Sentinel has significant experience. For its platform acquisitions, Sentinel will continue to pursue small tuck-in and transformational, like-sized add-on acquisitions as an important dimension of its investment strategy. The junior capital fund will primarily serve as a mezzanine financing source for new Sentinel platform companies.

"Over the course of five private equity funds and 22 years, Sentinel has developed a consistent and reliable way of doing business that has proven appealing to corporate sellers, small business owners, institutional sellers, and management teams," said John F. McCormack, Sentinel's co-founder. "In many of the businesses we have invested in, our ability and willingness to tackle financial and business complexity and relationship-intensive situations have worked well for us."

The new funds' investors include college and university endowments, foundations, state and government retirement systems, corporate pension plans, insurance companies, sovereign wealth funds, investment advisors, family offices, and Taft-Hartley plans located in the United States, Europe, China, Japan, Australia, and the Middle East. Sentinel's most recent prior fund, Sentinel Capital Partners V, L.P., initiated investment operations in 2014 with $1.3 billion of committed capital and is currently approximately 80% drawn.

Law firm Kirkland & Ellis LLP represented Sentinel. The Private Fund Group of Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC served in an advisory capacity with respect to the private placement.