page_title: Kohlberg Kravis Roberts
section_title: 1996–1999
hierarchical_section_title: Kohlberg Kravis Roberts / History / 1996–1999
caption_attribution_description: The Regal Cinemas Imax Theatre in New Rochelle, New York
context_page_description: KKR & Co. Inc. is an American global investment company that manages multiple alternative asset classes, including private equity, energy, infrastructure, real estate, credit, and, through its strategic partners, hedge funds. The firm has completed more than 280 private equity investments in portfolio companies with approximately $545 billion of total enterprise value as of June 30, 2017. As of September 30, 2017, Assets Under Management and Fee Paying Assets Under Management were $153 billion and $114 billion, respectively.
  The firm was founded in 1976 by Jerome Kohlberg, Jr., and cousins Henry Kravis and George R. Roberts, all of whom had previously worked together at Bear Stearns, where they completed some of the earliest leveraged buyout transactions. Since its founding, KKR has completed a number of transactions, including the 1989 leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco, which was the largest buyout in history to that point, as well as the 2007 buyout of TXU, which is currently the largest buyout completed to date.
  KKR has offices in 21 cities in 16 countries across five continents.
context_section_description: By the mid-1990s, the debt markets were improving and KKR had moved on from the RJR Nabisco buyout. In 1996, KKR was able to complete the bulk of fundraising for what was then a record $6 billion private equity fund, the KKR 1996 Fund. However, KKR was still burdened by the performance of the RJR investment and repeated obituaries in the media. KKR was required by its investors to reduce the fees it charged and to calculate its carried interest based on the total profit of the fund (i.e., offsetting losses from failed deals against the profits from successful deals).
  KKR's activity level would accelerate over the second half of the 1990s making a series of notable investments including Spalding Holdings Corporation and Evenflo (1996), Newsquest (1996), KinderCare Learning Centers (1997), Amphenol Corporation (1997), Randalls Food Markets (1997), The Boyds Collection (1998), MedCath Corporation (1998), Willis Group Holdings (1998), Smiths Group (1999), and Wincor Nixdorf (1999).
  KKR's largest investment of the 1990s would be one of its least successful. In January 1998, KKR and Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst agreed to the $1.5 billion buyouts of Regal Entertainment Group. KKR and Hicks Muse had initially intended to combine Regal with Act III Cinemas, which KKR had acquired in 1997 for $706 million and United Artists Theaters, which Hicks Muse had agreed to acquire for $840 million in November 1997. Shortly after agreeing to the Regal takeover, the deal with United Artists fell apart, destroying the strategy to eliminate costs by building a larger combined company. Two years later, in 2000, Regal encountered significant financial issues and was forced to file for bankruptcy protection; the company passed to billionaire investor Philip Anschutz.
caption: KKR acquired Regal Cinemas in 1998, only to see the company in bankruptcy by 2000
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