IN OUR article on April 18, we highlighted that Techcomp Holdings and Health Management International had recently announced the emergence of a new substantial shareholder in the companies.
Our search on the Internet threw up precious little information on the shareholder, Kabouter Management.
Yesterday, we were delighted to receive an email from Craig Millikin of Kabouter which sheds more light on his fund, as follows:
“There are hundreds (perhaps thousands) of small, unregistered funds like Kabouter in the US. The US Securities and Exchange Commission requires that unregistered funds such as Kabouter do not provide details to the public on their website (they consider it to be advertising).
“Password access is necessary to comply with this rule, which is the reason you cannot gather any details about us on the Internet. This is very common for smaller funds in the US given the administrative burden of registering with the authorities here.
“Kabouter manages approximately US$200 million, focused on smaller companies outside the US. It was founded in late 2002 by Marcel Houtzager and Peter Zaldivar, formerly of Wanger Asset Management in Chicago (which is now owned by Bank of America). I joined them in early 2005, and we are now six people, including two based in Chennai, India. I am a principal along with Marcel and Peter.
“We look for businesses with reasonable economics and growth prospects, selling at decent valuations, and aspire to own them for the long term (at least five years). This is no easy task however, and you will frequently see us make mistakes.
“Nikhil Rastogi, a graduate of IIT in India, has been doing extensive work for us on the Singapore market. He recently spent a week there and will be traveling to your area frequently in future."
Recent NextInsight articles:
Mystery buyer: Who is new substantial shareholder of TECHCOMP and HMI?
TECHCOMP: From HK$50K to S$70 million in 20 years
