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The New York Sun By Josh Gerstein 8 November 2006 A lobbying and public communications shop with close ties to the Clintons and the Democratic Party, the Glover Park Group, has received a substantial infusion of capital from a Chicago private equity firm, Svoboda Collins LLC.
The Glover Park Group, which has offices in Washington and New York, is home to a number of Democratic heavyweights, including a former press secretary to President Clinton, Joseph Lockhart, and a longtime adviser to Senator Clinton, Howard Wolfson. Mr. Wolfson referred an inquiry about the deal to the chief operating officer at Glover Park, Chip Smith. Mr. Smith said the transaction did not represent a huge windfall for the firm's partners, but will provide capital to expand operations, including those in New York. "The purpose of this deal is to take our company to the next stage. If people were interested in cashing out, there were a lot of alternatives on the table," Mr. Smith said. Mr. Smith declined to give a dollar value for the deal, which delivers a stake of slightly more than 50% to the private investors. However, he said Glover Park expects more than $30 million in revenue this year. "We have a level of profit that is competitive or better than the rest of the industry," Mr. Smith said. One investor who is seeking to arrange an initial public offering for a group of lobbying firms, Kenneth Ducey Jr., said valuations for lobbying firms vary from four times to as much as 20 times earnings. "It's all over the map," he said. In the last year or two, a series of Washington-based lobbying firms have been snapped up, most by large public relations and advertising companies. |
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