By Chibuike Oguh
(Reuters) - Advent International, a U.S. private equity firm with $36 billion in assets under management, is set to raise $2 billion for its new technology-focused fund, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.
The fundraising underscores what data provider Preqin notes as demand to invest in tech-focused buyout funds which have outperformed their peers in other sectors since 2000.
The new fund comes after Advent's announcement in February that it had hired former TPG Capital partner Brian Taylor to oversee a new Silicon Valley-based technology investment team seeking buyout deals in North America and Europe.
The fund will reach its self-imposed "hard cap" limit, or the maximum it could raise, the sources said. It will co-invest alongside Advent's main Global Private Equity (GPE) IX, which concluded a $17.5 billion fundraising round in June, but it also will do its own deals, the sources said.
A spokesman for Advent declined to comment.
Investors such as pension funds and sovereign wealth funds have put more than half a trillion dollars into buyout funds focused on the technology space from 2008 to 2018, Preqin data showed. This has culminated in a flurry of deals involving companies across the tech spectrum, from social networks to cybersecurity.