About Nazca

• Founded: 1998

• Headquarters: Madrid, Spain

• Strategy: Mid-market buyout and growth equity, Spain and Portugal

• Track record: Over €2bn raised across eight funds since inception

• Leadership: Founded by partners including Carlos Tahín and Javier Loizaga

Nazca Capital closed a continuation vehicle for Zunibal, a technology provider serving fishing fleets and marine monitoring operators. Blue Earth Capital, a sustainability-focused investor, backed the transaction as the lead buyer. The structure allowed Nazca to retain the asset while offering liquidity to existing LPs and bringing in a new anchor investor aligned with the company's environmental monitoring mission.

Continuation funds in this size range have become a standard exit alternative for European mid-market GPs holding assets with clear runway but no natural strategic buyer. The Zunibal deal follows a similar pattern to Ardian's €300m continuation vehicle for French industrial software provider Sylob in late 2023 and Intermediate Capital Group's roughly €400m single-asset continuation for precision components maker IMA Group earlier this year. In each case, the GP argued for additional hold period based on product roadmap or margin expansion potential that hadn't fully materialized under the original fund's timeline. Blue Earth's participation signals LP appetite for continuation deals where the sustainability angle is operational, not cosmetic — Zunibal's monitoring tech ties directly to fisheries compliance and carbon tracking, giving the thesis weight beyond ESG labeling.

The question now is deployment pace and margin trajectory. Continuation vehicles typically come with a 3–5 year horizon and implicit pressure to justify the extended hold with measurable value creation milestones. If Zunibal's tech stack expands beyond monitoring into fleet optimization or carbon credit verification, the runway justifies itself. If growth stalls at the monitoring layer, the deal becomes another example of GPs overestimating the value of incremental hold time in a mature portfolio company.

Source: AltAssets