A Practical Cross Border Insight Into Private Equity'

1 Overview

1.1 What are the most common types of private equity transactions in your jurisdiction? What is the current state of the market for these transactions? Have you seen any changes in the types of private equity transactions being implemented in the last two to three years?

All of the standard transaction strategies to acquire portfolio companies are commonly used in Switzerland. We assume that regular leveraged buyouts have accounted for a majority of the transactions in recent years.

1.2 What are the most significant factors or developments encouraging or inhibiting private equity transactions in your jurisdiction?

The most significant event for the Swiss economy was the abandonment of the CHF/EUR minimum exchange rate by the Swiss National Bank (SNB) in January 2015, which resulted in the appreciation of the CHF against the EUR. However, while 2015 was characterised by rather low M&A levels (compared to 2014, the amount of transactions decreased by