Skandia
Strategic Concepts & Mechanics
Primary Evidence
"The change in strategy at Skandia in 1998 gave Christer Dahlström and his three colleagues the opportunity to buy the business, which they named Priveq (a play on “private equity,” which is the English equivalent of risk capital firms). Skandia invested 600 million in the first fund, and Norwegian Orkla, ICA, Handelsbanken Liv and the Fourth Swedish National Pension Fund each invested 100 million. With a billion in their pockets, they moved out from Skandia on Sveavägen to their own office, hired four people and got started."
"In the 1980s and early 1990s, Skandia was the kingdom of CEO Björn Wolrath. The company was listed on the stock exchange but had no main owner. Wolrath made it his mission to defend Skandia at any cost against intruders, not least SEB, which made several attempts to take over the entire insurance company. Even then, long before Lars-Eric Petersson’s arrival, Skandia was the very epitome of management control in the absence of strong owners."
"Dahlström focused on family businesses, and that was how Nefab, Nordgren’s packaging factory in Hälsingland, came his way. It was one of Skandia’s insurance salespeople who mentioned that the Nordgren family was going through a generational shift."
"But Peter “Pirre” Wallenberg, who sat on Skandia’s board, did not think that at the board level, in one of Sweden’s larger companies, they should discuss what he considered individual small deals. The solution was to start the subsidiary Skandia Investment, with its own management and board, and place the unlisted holdings there."
"In retrospect, it has become important to determine who was first. Who wrote the first chapter in the unlikely story that began in Sweden during the second half of the 1980s? One of the first to see the potential in trading unlisted companies was Skandia’s then CFO Björn Hall, when he founded Skandia Investment – but the one who handled the company acquisitions was Christer Dahlström. The first to start his own business and make acquisitions according to the American model was Mikael Ahlström. But Björn Savén started the first fund. One of Nordic Capital’s founders, Robert Andreen, is annoyed at Hall for taking credit for starting Nordic, when Andreen claims that Skandia was just a part-owner in the beginning. Hall then responds with a smile: “But you, who hired whom?”"
"A more significant step was taken when we purchased about five percent of Sweden's largest insurance conglomerate, Skandia, which was significantly undervalued"