Altimeter Capital

American investment firm

Altimeter Capital Management, LP

Company type| Private
Industry| Investment management
Founded| 2008; 17 years ago (2008)
Founder| Brad Gerstner
Headquarters| One International Place, Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Products|

* Hedge fund
* Venture capital

AUM| US$6.75 billion (September 2024)[1]

Number of employees

| 26 (2024)
Website|

* altimeter.com
* altimetergrowth.com

Footnotes / references
[2]

Altimeter Capital is an American investment firm based in Boston, Massachusetts and Menlo Park, California.[3] The firm focuses on technology investments in both public and private markets globally.

## Background

[edit]

In 2008, Brad Gerstner founded Altimeter Capital in Boston, Massachusetts.[4] It was launched with less than $3 million from Gerstner's friends and family during the 2008 financial crisis.[4][5] Prior to that, Gerstner worked at PAR Capital Management as well as General Catalyst.[6]

A month after the launch of Altimeter Capital, an office was opened in Menlo Park, California.[4]

In 2013, Altimeter Capital closed its first venture capital fund at $75 million.[3]

In September 2020, Altimeter Growth Corp was listed on the Nasdaq (Ticker: AGC) raising $450 million. AGC is a SPAC which is a blank-check company. In April 2021 it was announced that AGC would merge with Singapore ridesharing company, Grab to help it list on Nasdaq under the ticker, GRAB.[7][8]

In January 2021, a second SPAC, Altimeter Growth Corporation 2 was listed on New York Stock Exchange (Ticker: AGCB) raising $450 million.[9][10] It was terminated early in December 2022 due to its inability to secure a suitable merger deal.[10]

## Business overview

[edit]

For public markets, Altimeter Capital manages a long / short public equity fund that invests in technology companies.[11] The public equity fund is noted for its strong performance, averaging annual returns of 29.52% since 2011.[11]

For private markets, Altimeter Capital manages private growth equity funds that invest in both early and later stage technology companies. Its first private fund was closed in 2013.[3]

## Public market investments

[edit]

### United Continental Holdings

[edit]

In January 2016, Altimeter Capital pressured United Continental Holdings to change its board of directors.[12] Gerstner released a statement stating how investors were disappointed with the poor performance and decision making of the company in recent years.[12] United Continental Holdings eventually gave in and changed its board of directors.[13]

### Meta Platforms

[edit]

In October 2022, Gerstner on behalf of Altimeter Capital wrote an open letter to Meta Platforms and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg.[14][15] In the letter, Gerstner criticized the company stating it had too many employees and was moving too slowly to retain investor confidence.[14][15] He recommended reducing the headcount expense by 20% and limiting Metaverse investments to $5 billion per year.[14][15] A few weeks later, Meta laid off over 11,000 employees.[16]

## Venture Capital funds

[edit]

Fund[17][5] | Vintage Year  | Committed Capital ($m)

|
|

Altimeter Private Partners Fund I  | 2013  | 75
Altimeter Private Partners Fund II  | 2015  | 225
Altimeter Private Partners Fund III  | 2017  | 200
Altimeter Growth Cascade Fund  | 2020  | 100
Altimeter Growth Castle Fund  | 2020  | 32
Altimeter Growth Lincoln Fund  | 2021  | 60

## Notable venture capital investments

[edit]

* 23andMe[5]
* AppDynamics
* ByteDance
* Cazoo[5]
* Epic Games[5]
* Expedia[11]
* FTX[18]
* GitLab
* Grab[7]
* HubSpot[11]
* Julep
* MongoDB
* Namely
* OfferUp
* Okta
* Pine Labs[19]
* Plaid[5]
* Priceline[11]
* Roblox Corporation[5]
* Snowflake[11]
* SoFi[5]
* StockX
* Twilio[11]
* Uber[11]
* UiPath
* Unity Technologies
* Vroom

## References

[edit]

1. ^ "SEC FORM 13F-HR". www.sec.gov.
2. ^ "Form ADV" (PDF). SEC. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 15, 2024.
3. ^ a b c Kolodny, Lora (August 1, 2013). "Altimeter Capital CEO on Travel, Enterprise and the Sharing Economy". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Archived from the original on November 13, 2016. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
4. ^ a b c Levy, Ari (November 8, 2013). "Online-Travel King Brad Gerstner Wants Venture Capital Empire". www.bloomberg.com. Archived from the original on July 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
5. ^ a b c d e f g h "After Snowflake windfall, Altimeter Capital captures dealmaking spotlight | PitchBook". pitchbook.com. April 14, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
6. ^ "Bradley Gerstner Investor Profile: Portfolio & Exits | PitchBook". pitchbook.com. Archived from the original on July 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
7. ^ a b Lee, Yoolim (June 9, 2021). "Singapore's Grab Delays Merger Completion to Fourth Quarter". www.bloomberg.com. Archived from the original on June 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
8. ^ "Grab IPO: what to know and how to buy Grab shares". IG. April 21, 2021. Archived from the original on July 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
9. ^ Schubarth, Cromwell (January 7, 2021). "Bay Area's first IPO of 2021 raises $400M for an Altimeter Capital SPAC". www.bizjournals.com. Archived from the original on January 7, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
10. ^ a b "SPACS Altimeter Growth II, One Equity Open Water I to liquidate early | Seeking Alpha". seekingalpha.com. December 2, 2022. Retrieved December 3, 2022.
11. ^ a b c d e f g h Gaffney, Mark (October 6, 2020). "Brad Gerstner's Altimeter Capital has an $8B profit on Snowflake. A new $450M tech SPAC. And annual 13F returns of 30% since 2011". WhaleWisdom Alpha. Archived from the original on July 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
12. ^ a b "Investors push for board shake-up at United Continental Holdings". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Archived from the original on December 18, 2024. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
13. ^ Wang, Christine (May 8, 2017). "United was 'clumsy' at first in scandal, but eventually 'got it right,' investor says". CNBC. Archived from the original on November 26, 2022. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
14. ^ a b c Leswing, Kif (October 24, 2022). "Meta shareholder writes critical open letter saying company needs to slash headcount and stop spending so much money on 'metaverse'". CNBC. Archived from the original on November 26, 2022. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
15. ^ a b c "Meta Needs to Slash Metaverse Spending to 'Get Mojo Back,' Shareholder Says". Bloomberg.com. October 24, 2022. Archived from the original on December 17, 2022. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
16. ^ Vanian, Jonathan (November 9, 2022). "Meta laying off more than 11,000 employees: Read Zuckerberg's letter announcing the cuts". CNBC. Archived from the original on November 10, 2022. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
17. ^ "Altimeter Capital - Venture | Palico". www.palico.com. Archived from the original on July 9, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.
18. ^ "FTX Fiasco Hits Investors From Tiger Global to Tom Brady". finance.yahoo.com. Archived from the original on November 26, 2022. Retrieved November 26, 2022.
19. ^ Bhakta, Pratik. "Pine Labs: Actis, Altimeter put $82 million in Pine Labs to grow roots". The Economic Times. Archived from the original on July 10, 2021. Retrieved July 7, 2021.

## External links

[edit]

* www.altimeter.com (Company Website)
* www.altimetergrowth.com Archived April 8, 2021, at the Wayback Machine (Capital Markets Platform)

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Hedge funds

Investment
strategy|

| Arbitrage /
relative value|

* Capital structure arbitrage
* Convertible arbitrage
* Equity market neutral
* Fixed income arbitrage / fixed-income relative-value investing
* Statistical arbitrage
* Volatility arbitrage

|

Event-driven|

* Shareholder activism
* Distressed securities
* Risk arbitrage
* Special situation

Directional|

* Convergence trade
* Commodity trading advisors / managed futures account
* Dedicated short
* Global macro
* Long/short equity
* Trend following

Other|

* Fund of hedge funds / Multi-manager

Trading|

* Algorithmic trading
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Related
terms|

| Markets|

* Commodities
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* Equity
* Fixed income
* Foreign exchange
* Money markets
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|

Misc|

* Absolute return
* Arbitrage pricing theory
* Assets under management
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* Capital asset pricing model (alpha / beta / security characteristic line)
* Fundamental analysis
* Hedge
* Securitization
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* Taxation of private equity and hedge funds
* Technical analysis

Investors|

* Vulture funds
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Private equity and venture capital

Investment types|

* Buyout
* Leveraged
* Growth
* Venture
* Mezzanine
* Growth
* Secondaries
* Equity co-investment
* NAV lending

History|

* Early history
* 1980s
* 1990s
* 2000s
* 2010s
* 2020s

Terms and
concepts|

| Buyout|

* Financial sponsor
* Management buyout
* Divisional buyout
* Buy–sell agreement
* Leveraged recapitalization
* Dividend recapitalization

|

Venture|

* Angel investor
* Business incubator
* Post-money valuation
* Pre-money valuation
* SAFE
* Seed money
* Startup company
* Venture capital financing
* Venture debt
* Venture round

Structure|

* Private equity firms and funds
* Limited partnership
* Limited liability company
* Carried interest
* Management fee
* Pledge fund
* Publicly traded private equity
* Business Development Company
* Venture capital trust
* Private investment in public equity (PIPE)
* SPAC

Investors|

* Corporations
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Related
financial terms|

* AUM
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* Capital commitment
* Capital structure
* Distribution waterfall
* EBITDA
* Envy ratio
* High-yield debt
* IPO
* IRR
* Leverage
* Liquidation preference
* M&A
* PME
* Taxation of private equity and hedge funds
* Undercapitalization
* Vintage year

* List of private equity firms
* List of venture capital firms

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