Sovereign has been voted ‘Investor of the Year’ for the second year running.

The judges praised Sovereign’s record of having “consistently grown and developed firms in the education sector” and providing “strategic support to the portfolio companies to help them to become market leaders by enhancing existing services and products as well as launching new services.”

Judges included prominent figures from the education sector, including: Charles Clarke, former Education Secretary; Paul Clark, Director of Policy at Universities UK; and Professor Sir Drummond Bone, Chairman of the Observatory on Borderless Higher Education and senior advisor to Laureate International Universities.

Sovereign was a finalist in the Investor of the Year category at the 2011 Laing & Buisson ‘Independent Healthcare Awards.

These awards celebrate the range of achievements within the independent healthcare sector and paid tribute to individuals, teams and organisations who have demonstrated outstanding excellence

Sovereign Capital was one of only four UK private equity firms to receive a Silver Award at the Private Equity Exchange Awards 2010.

The winners of these awards were chosen by an advisory board made up of Limited Partners and private equity experts, who researched the global market and followed a “qualitative oriented methodology based on IRR and performance on the long run”.

Sovereign Capital was awarded the closely contested Education Investor of the Year accolade for its winning approach of being both “hard-headed and completely committed to improving standards of education”.

The judges praised Sovereign’s “buy-and-build approach and its willingness to take small organisations and stick with them over many years to make them successful.”

Sovereign Capital won ‘Small Buyout House of the Year” category at the Unquote” British Private Equity Awards 2008.

Acknowledging clear leadership in the UK lower mid market, the award was presented to Sovereign in recognition of its consistently high standards in successful deal origination, execution, portfolio management and exits. The judges praised Sovereign for “doing what it does best” in the ongoing application of its Buy & Build strategy and for its “incredible”, yet prudent, deal flow and strong exits.

Sovereign Capital won “Deal of the Year: UK & Ireland” at the Real Deals / EVCA European Private Equity Awards 2008.

The award recognised the success of Sovereign’s 11.9x investment return via the flotation of CVS in October 2007. The judges recognised the value created by Sovereign’s proven Buy & Build strategy which, through 39 separate follow-on acquisitions, developed CVS into the UK’s largest group of veterinary surgeries.

Sovereign Capital won the overall European Grand Prix “Mid Market Deal of Year” category at the Real Deals / EVCA European Private Equity Awards 2008.

The judges applauded the significant scale that Sovereign developed in transforming the landscape of the small animal, first opinion, veterinary market and the outstanding investment return that Sovereign delivered to its investors.

Sovereign Capital won “Mid-Market Deal of the Year” at Real Deals / BVCA Private Equity Awards 2008 for its 11.9x exit of CVS.

In summing up the CVS deal, the judges said: “This is a stunning deal. The veterinary market was considered by a lot of investors, but Sovereign was the firm that made a great success of it.” Sovereign has successfully differentiated itself in the lower-mid market through its deep sector knowledge, direct origination and, above all, its consistent buy & build strategy, noted by the judges as “staying loyal to its winning formula of buy-and-build”.