Overview

Our flagship funds pursue investments in growth-oriented middle market companies in North America and Europe. Our senior investment professionals average over 20 years of experience investing in, advising, underwriting and restructuring leveraged companies.

We seek to invest in companies with strong management teams where our capital can accelerate and maximize growth over the lifecycle of the investment. We seek to partner with strong existing management teams where our capital and expertise can drive value creation aimed at compounding growth to seek to generate alpha. We add value to our management partnerships by:

Capitalizing the company for growth at entry
Utilizing our network to enhance resources available to fully exploit a company’s potential
Leveraging our experience in capital markets activities
Implementing best practices
Assisting with strategic value-add initiatives, such as acquisitions

Corporate Opportunity Funds

We focus on finding opportunities and investing in market inefficiencies in high quality, growth-oriented, franchise companies through four principal transaction types: (i) prudently leveraged control buyouts; (ii) growth equity; (iii) rescue capital; and (iv) distressed-for-control.

Our buyout-focused approach, with the ability to flex into distressed investing during periods of volatility, allows us to quickly adapt to changing market environments and continue sourcing and executing on a broad funnel of deal flow irrespective of market conditions. We pursue a relative value investment philosophy focused on identifying opportunities that maximize attractive net returns, as opposed to limiting opportunities to a specific transaction type or structure. We believe that this strategy is highly differentiated amongst our peers and widens our universe of potential investment opportunities beyond that of many other buyout firms.

We manage six flagship funds focused primarily on North America and Europe:

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund, L.P. (2003);

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund II, L.P. (2006);

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund III, L.P. (2008);

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund IV, L.P. (2012);

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund V, L.P. (2017); and

Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund VI, L.P. (2020).

Targeted Investments

We seek compelling investments in leading companies that typically have not maximized their growth potential. We invest our capital in a variety of structures, depending on the needs of a company or a particular transaction. We are equally comfortable investing in both majority and shared-control situations and our Private Equity Group has developed extensive expertise in working through the issues that can surround shared-control investing. As a result, this flexibility helps us to develop a creative transaction that meets the needs of a company's various stakeholders.

Targeted Investment Characteristics

Differentiated or disruptive business model
Multiple controllable growth levers
Experienced leadership characterized by strong processes and culture
Defensible market position
Ability to capitalize on supportive beta
Strong customer base

Value Proposition

For Management Teams

We work in partnership with our portfolio company management teams to employ Ares' Value Creation System, typically over a five to seven-year investment horizon. By properly capitalizing a company at the time of our investment, management can refocus its efforts toward compounding EBITDA growth and maximizing free cash flow. The chart below illustrates the prototypical actions and objectives of this process, which are customized for any given particular situation.

Corporate Opportunities Action Plan

Stage 1

Capitalize Balance Sheet for Growth

Inject equity capital

Facilitate balance sheet restructuring if required

Reduce near-term debt maturities and increase liquidity

Stage 2

Focus on Operational Excellence

Augment management team as appropriate

Formalize process improvement practices

Develop long-term strategic plan in order to maximize value of business model

Stage 3

Execute on Growth Strategy

Invest in growth capital projects to enhance capabilities

Opportunistically pursue acquisitions

Inject additional equity to meet growth objectives

Stage 4

Position Company for Exit

Integrate acquisitions and realize synergies

Develop investment thesis for next owner

Actively explore exit alternatives

Measurable Objective

Enhance Liquidity to Pursue Growth

Expand EBITDA Margins

Grow Top Line Revenues

Maximize Free Cash Flow

For Investors

The combination of our differentiated strategy and broad resources of Ares Management widens our universe of potential investment opportunities and allows us to deploy capital across various market environments while remaining highly selective. Many of these situations originate from proprietary channels and require us to generate creative and complex structuring solutions.

Portfolio of Investments

While open to pursuing investments in a range of industries, we specifically target market-leading businesses that demonstrate attractive long-term growth prospects. We aim to balance our portfolios with a diverse mix of industries and types of securities. The table below lists our current platform equity investments.

Current Portfolio of Equity Investments¹
Initial Investment	Industry	Headquarters Location	Description
2017	Energy	TX	Provider of development capital to upstream oil and gas operators
2017	Healthcare Services	IL	Independent multi-specialty physician group
2017	Energy	TX	Long-haul midstream logistics company
2020	Healthcare Services	United Kingdom	A leading provider of full-time, specialist-nursing mental healthcare care for adults with high acuity needs
2020	Telecom	CT	Leading provider of telecommunication services in the U.S.
2020	Energy	TX	Midstream company focused on developing and operating oil gathering and blending infrastructure assets
2010	Retail	CA	Leading retailer of music products in the United States
2021	Industrial	MO	Pure-play technology and solutions integrator
2021	Healthcare	CA	Leading provider of aesthetic dermatology solutions
2014	Building Products	United Kingdom	Greater London focused residential homebuilder

_{The Ares current private equity corporate opportunities investments represent all unrealized and partially realized investmentsmade by the corporate opportunities funds as of December 31, 2021, with the exception of toe-holds and those investments that have been substantially written off or where the remaining value of the investment is less than 2% of total capital invested. The specific portfolio companies identified are not representative of all of the private equity corporate opportunities investments and it should not be assumed that the investment in the portfolio companies identified was or will be profitable. Actual holdings will vary for each private equity fund and there is no guarantee that a particular private equity fund will hold any or all of the portfolio companies listed (or investments in portfolio companies comparable to them). Please see a full list of Ares private equity investments excluding toe-holds on the following page: full list of investments}