For investment firms wanting to start relationships with new investors, the lengthy lockdown across Europe and accompanying travel bans has made it impossible for investors to conduct proper on-site due diligence.

For the past year, this has been a true headache for many managers.

Private market boutique Altamar Capital Partners believes it is the first manager to tackle this issue in a different way as the firm has started to reopen its headquarters for potential and existing investors – at least virtually.

In a Google Maps-inspired universe, investors are able to enter the reception, where two people await behind a counter, and move around in the company's two floors in Spain's capital city Madrid.

In the tour visitors can visit 17 different rooms – from operational functions such as legal and risk and compliance, to the investment team, portfolio analytics and even the private offices of two of the EUR 8bn investment firm's co-founders and co-CEOs, Claudio Aguirre and Jose Luis Molina. Each unit is accompanied by its own organizational chart and description.

The virtual tour was created to overcome obstacles to doing on-site due diligence caused by the pandemic, and the impact of Covid is felt throughout the tour – Altamar's employees are seen wearing masks and "keep your distance" signs are clearly visible, though accompanied by "& keep smiling".

"We're a Spanish manager building our brand in Europe, and by creating a virtual tour enabling potential investors to get to know Altamar's people and culture, we thought it would give us a possibility to differentiate ourselves, in a way that can't be done in a power point presentation," Altamar Capital Partners' Managing Director and Nordic client lead Sara Chance says to AMWatch.

"We wanted to invite potential investors to our office and demonstrate that Altamar does indeed exist and has the policies, procedures and infrastructure in place that we claim. We thought we would give our investors the opportunity to go look for themselves," she continues.

The idea originated in Africa

Altamar Capital Partners believes it is the first manager to create a virtual tour of its headquarters as a means of leveraging technology rather than solely relying on Teams, Skype or Zoom meetings.

According to Chance, the intention is to help investors get more comfortable with the operational part of their due diligence.

The tour aims to ease access for potential investors, even though obviously it can't be relied on exclusively, Chance explains.

The idea to showcase the entire headquarter originated thousands of kilometers from Madrid when she was shown potential wind energy investments in East Africa. These green infrastructure assets were filmed by a drone from above, but Chance nevertheless wondered whether the footage in fact depicted the real assets in question or not.

To avoid potential investors questioning the virtual tour's credibility, Altamar commissioned a verification report made by global consultancy Pwc.

"Pwc hasn't given us a grade or their opinion but simply met with the people in our office to verify that they exist and do what they claim to do. They have verified all of our procedures and policies on a granular basis down to daily cash flow management." Chance says.

Lower the hurdles

So far, a handful of existing clients from across Europe have experienced the virtual tour firsthand and thought it was "really exciting and very positive," Chance says.

The managing director has spent most of her career promoting alternative investments to institutional investors in Europe, and she is under no illusion that Altamar's new virtual office tour is easy for rival firm to replicate.

"There's absolutely nothing stopping other firms from doing the same, and I'm actually surprised that no one has done it yet. But if this becomes market standard then we were one of the first to come out with it. It seems so simple, but I haven't heard anyone else doing it so far," she says and continues:

"With the combination of the tour and the report, we hope to help lower the hurdles for LPs (Limited Partners, ed.) in the process of making a commitment and to reassure them that we are who we say we are in this day and age of smoke and mirrors."

Founded in 2004, Altamar Capital Partners is a private markets boutique investing in private equity, venture capital, private debt, infrastructure and real estate. Altamar has invested in 372 funds from more than 213 managers in primary, secondary and co-investments.

Beyond Madrid, the company has offices Barcelona, Santiago de Chile and New York. In time, the firm plans to make the tour available for all of their offices and individual investment teams.

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