Blackstone Inc. wrapped up a record $5.2 billion fund for deals that defy easy categorization and aren’t constrained by any particular investment style.
The fund, Blackstone Tactical Opportunities Fund IV, surpassed a $4 billion target for rounding up investor dollars, said a person familiar with the matter. The haul gives Blackstone cash to hunt for deals after banks pulled back from financing following the collapse of three lenders this year.
Launched in 2012, the Blackstone business nicknamed “Tac Opps” for its wide-ranging targets has grown into a $34 billion behemoth and underscores private equity’s expansion beyond its buyout roots.
Tac Opps deals fall outside private equity or credit, and in some cases blend aspects of the two. The fund can also do deals alongside other groups inside Blackstone, magnifying the $1 trillion firm’s bets on favored themes and sectors.
Testing Ground
It has been a testing ground for new deal structures for Blackstone, spawning business ideas along the way. Tac Opps made bets on growth equity — which typically involves taking stakes in late-stage startups on the verge of profitability — before Blackstone launched a group dedicated to those deals. Tac Opps also did an insurance deal that paved the way for a broader firm strategy of taking stakes in insurers in exchange for landing new assets to manage.
Pensions and endowments can order custom strategies from Tac Opps, and Blackstone expects these accounts to bring the platform’s total from its latest round of fundraising to almost $10 billion.
Over the years, Tac Opps has invested in everything from a wireless tower operator to insurers. The latest fund’s deals include an outdoor advertising company that manages the famous billboard in New York’s Times Square.
Blackstone veteran David Blitzer, 53, pitched and launched Tac Opps after starting the European private equity business, and he’s earned a reputation in the firm as an entrepreneurial dealmaker.
The global head of Tac Opps is also building a personal sports empire outside Blackstone. Blitzer and Apollo Global Management Inc. co-founder Josh Harris jointly own the Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils, among other sports teams. They’re general partners of the Crystal Palace Football Club.