Golding Capital Partners, one of Europe’s leading independent asset managers for alternative investments, has expanded its senior management and partner team with Dorothea Sztopko. In the new role of Chief Operating Officer (COO) she has been responsible since January 2023 for systematically optimising and automating internal processes and for building a new IT structure. By appointing Sztopko, Golding is aiming to establish a target operating model, realise synergies by implementing change management projects, and drive forward the company’s transformation process. As in prior years, Golding repeated this dynamic growth again in 2022. A new fundraising record was set, with capital commitments of some €2.1 billion. Total assets under management increased as a result to nearly €13.3 billion – another record for the company. In addition to its ongoing international expansion, the main growth driver was high demand for specialist products in the co-investments and secondaries segments.
The strategic expansion of the partner team to include Dorothea Sztopko as new COO reflects both the company’s dynamic growth in recent years and its ambitious plans for future development.
“Golding has been building its exceptional success story for more than 20 years. I am delighted to now be part of that, and with my team to ensure that we are well positioned to achieve our strategic corporate goals”, says Sztopko, COO at Golding.
She and her team are responsible for establishing a target operating model, for optimising internal procedures, and for continuing the digitisation process. The underlying objective of all the measures is to embed organisational excellence in all areas of the company.
“Our new partner Dorothea Sztopko is a highly qualified and experienced operations expert, and she will make a decisive contribution to achieving our ambitious growth targets. Given that we are expanding our product range, and in view of our further international expansion, best-in-class digital process management and a culture of continuous improvement add value directly for us as a company and for our investors”, says Jeremy Golding, founder and managing partner of Golding.
Dorothea Sztopko has two MBA degrees and has more than 15 years experience of digital transformation, operational excellence and change management. For more than ten years she held international board seats and senior management positions in the banking and insurance sector, most recently at Raiffeisenbank International and at ING, a Dutch bank.
Ongoing strong demand facilitates records for fund raising and investments.
Golding continued its successful growth last year in terms of both new capital commitments received and investments. The strong fundraising performance was due to the traditional flagship products, but particularly to dedicated co-investment and secondaries solutions also. Among the successful closings were a specialised secondaries fund, two infrastructure products and most recently a buyout co-investment fund, all of which were significantly oversubscribed.
Building on this success, several follow-on products in the three asset classes, private credit, buyout and infrastructure, are now in the market or at an advanced planning stage. On the investment side, Golding also set a new record in terms of commitment volume across all three asset classes (primaries, secondaries, co-investments), with new commitments of €1.8 billion.
Internationalisation pays off – ambitious growth targets again for 2023
Golding can also point to a positive performance in its international expansion. The alternative asset manager attracted new investors from France, Spain, Sweden and Slovenia, as well as its first European managed account mandate from outside Germany. The total volume of commitments from international investors came to nearly €200 million in 2022.
Golding is again aiming for ambitious targets this year. The goal is to raise more than €2 billion in new fund commitments by the end of the year, also from international LPs. They will have a total of nine products in fundraising to choose from in 2023.
Link press photo Dorothea Sztopko
