Nordic Private Equity: Argentum at Real Deals Nordic Summit 2023
On October 10, 2023, Real Deals held its first Nordic Summit in Stockholm, where participants from the Nordic private equity community gathered to discuss the future investment landscape. Investment Director Jørgen Hjorth Blystad from Argentum shared his experiences and insights about the market.
Over 100 participants from the Nordic private equity community gathered at the Grand Hotel to discuss important topics such as the impact of the changing macroeconomic landscape on the industry, LP perspectives, high-attractiveness sectors for investments, and new ESG requirements.
As part of the program, Jørgen H. Blystad, Investment Director at Argentum, participated in a “fireside chat.” The discussion explored whether the future of the Nordic private equity sector would be sector-specific or generalist-oriented. Blystad joined David Samuelson from Nordic Capital and Björn Larsson from Axcel, with Xhulio Ismalaj from Real Deals moderating.
In the conversation, Blystad shared insights into how Argentum views the Nordic market and how the company actively seeks the best investments. Argentum has had a clear presence as an investor in PE funds in the Nordics for more than 20 years. Blystad highlighted a trend where increased competition and market maturity necessitate more specific strategies to positively stand out and generate excess returns.
Specialists can have a better opportunity for deeper insight and knowledge than generalists with a broader perspective. Such advantages must be leveraged across all parts of the investment axis, from initially finding attractive investment opportunities to executing them, exercising value-creating ownership during the holding phase, and finally concluding the process with the sale of the company.
Furthermore, he emphasized that Argentum looks for investment strategies that aim to find and build robust business models that are less cyclically exposed, where value creation is more significantly based on the manager’s efforts and skills rather than external factors.
