2005 and prior

TowerBrook Capital Partners was formed as a spin-off of George Soros' equity management firm.^[4] TowerBrook's co-founders, Neal Moszkowski and Ramez Sousou, had previously served as co-heads of Soros Fund Management's private equity arm, Soros Private Equity (SPEP); SPEP launched its first fund around 2000.^[7] SPEP was also an early investor^[8] in companies such as Eircom,^[4] CSTV Networks, and Cablecom, which it sold to Liberty Global in 2005.^[8] In April 2005,^[4] Moszkowski and Sousou spun out SPEP from Soros Fund Management to establish TowerBrook Capital Partners in New York and London.^[9]

2006–2013

TowerBrook closed its TowerBrook Investors II LP fund at $1.3 billion in March 2006,^[9] with George Soros contributing a significant amount.^[10] Later that month, the fund purchased 67% of French engineering company GSE, which had an estimated value of €230 million.^[11] In 2006,^[12] TowerBrook purchased 75% of the St. Louis Blues National Hockey League team^[13] for $150 million, also then purchasing the lease of the Scottrade Center in St. Louis, Missouri.^[14] The purchase made TowerBrook "the only private equity firm to own a share in a professional sports team," according to Sports Business Daily.^[12] Also in 2006, TowerBrook raised $850 million from the sale of WellCare Health Plans, and a further $160 million from the disposal of Tradedoubler.^[7] After acquisition of clothing company Odlo in 2006,^[15] in 2007 TowerBrook purchased the designer shoe company Jimmy Choo^[10] for £180 million.^[16] In 2007, it invested in U.S. company Sound Inpatient Physicians.^[17]

In 2008, TowerBrook raised $2.8 billion from investors for its third fund.^[10][18] According to Financial Times, the successful fundraising during a difficult economic period was noted as reflecting TowerBrook's sharp decline in its investing pace during a credit boom, while keeping debt for new investments "below the market average."^[10] The fund's first deal was in 2009, when TowerBrook acquired 60% of Autodistribution Group for $139 million,^[19] selling the stake six years later to Bain Capital.^[20] In 2009, TowerBrook founded Haymarket Financial, or HayFin, initially as a corporate lender for small and medium businesses. Investors, including Sunseeker, Ronald Mourad Cohen, Lord Rothschild, and Future Fund, invested a total of $580 million in HayFin in September 2010, raising the lender's equity to about €1 billion.^[21] TowerBrook sold its stake in HayFin in 2017.^[22] In 2010, Towerbrook acquired the building company Monier^[23] and sold Broadlane Group for $850 million.^[24]

TowerBrook purchased the fashion retailer Phase Eight for £80 million in February 2011.^[25] Three months later,^[26] TowerBrook sold Jimmy Choo,^[5] for a reported £500 million.^[16] In 2012, TowerBrook sold part of its stake in the St. Louis Blues^[14] to a consortium of investors, retaining a stake of around 50%.^[27] Also in 2012, TowerBrook acquired a majority interest in the professional coaching business Vistage International.^[28] In 2013, Towerbrook acquired scrap refiner Metallum for £295 million^[29] and True Religion Apparel for $835 million.^[13] That year, the company also sold Rave Cinemas to Cinemark.^[30] In early 2013, The Financial Times wrote that TowerBrook was "defying a depressed fundraising market" by raising $3.5 billion for its new fund,^[2] TowerBrook Investors IV.^[31] Originally targeted at $3 billion, Fund IV became "considerably oversubscribed", receiving subscriptions of over $5 billion.^[2]

2014–2020

In 2014, TowerBrook acquired Independent Clinical Services from The Blackstone Group for $408 million.^[32] In June of that year, TowerBrook portfolio company Volution Group completed an initial public offering (IPO) on the London Stock Exchange,^[33] diluting TowerBrook’s stake from 85%^[34] to 61%.^[35] In 2015, TowerBrook sold Phase Eight, then valued at £300 million, to the Foschini Group of South Africa,^[25] and sold a 10% stake in itself to Wafra Investment Advisory Group "to free up capital to spend on the business."^[36] In November 2015 TowerBrook secured over $800 million^[37] for its new TowerBrook Structured Opportunities Fund,^[38] exceeding its initial target of $600 million.^[37] Also in 2015, Towerbrook purchased American Apparel business J.Jill^[3][39] for around $400 million,^[40] and acquired a stake in U.S.-based Accretive Health for $200 million.^[41] In March 2016, TowerBrook sold the majority of Van Geloven, a Dutch snack maker it had acquired the previous year, to McCain Foods.^[42] In April 2016, TowerBrook announced it was partnering with U.S.-based health system Ascension Health Alliance to develop Ascension's healthcare technology business TRIMEDX.^[43] By that summer, the firm had raised a total of $9.4 billion from investors in four private equity funds and one structured opportunities fund, designed to allow the firm to make minority investments.^[44][45]

The firm completed eight investments in 2017,^[45] including purchasing 47% of the aerospace company Aernova^[46] and acquisition of loyalty services business Rewards Network.^[47] TowerBrook retained 50% of J.Jill stock when taking it public on the New York Stock Exchange in March 2017.^[48] Several months later, True Religion filed for bankruptcy protection, stating that TowerBrook would "swap debt into equity, handing them majority control."^[49] The bankruptcy plan was approved by the courts in October 2017,^[50] with True Religion's debt cut by $354 million.^[48]

In June 2018, $4.25 billion was raised for a new Towerbrook buyout fund, Towerbrook Investors V. $1.05 billion was also raised for a Structured Opportunities Fund.^[44][45] In 2018 and 2019, TowerBrook made significant investments in Validity Finance,^[51] GBA Group,^[38] Orchid Underwriters^[52] and Studio Movie Grill.^[6] TowerBrook listed 30 active investments on its website in 2020, among them KeHe Distributors, BevMo!, and OVH.^[53][6] In 2019, Towerbrook became the first "mainstream private-equity shop" to be certified as a B corporation.^[54] In October 2019 it was reported that TowerBrook and Ascension Health were co-investing in the hospice company Compassus through Ascension TowerBrook Healthcare Opportunities (ATHO), a new joint venture.^[55] In February 2020, the company was researching a sale of Independent Clinical Services.^[56]