While Detroit preps for another visit to Washington and a second attempt at a bailout, LA meanwhile is hosting its annual auto show.  The Big 3 are in their usual spots on the LA Convention Center floor, however, in a sign of the times, it appears as though one non-public domestic car company is reducing expenses where it can.

In comparison to the neighboring bright and showy displays of Kia, VW and Audi, Cerberus backed Chrysler’s brands are practically in the dark (see Jeep on the left vs. Audi on the right in pic below).  Despite opting for the basic-lighting package and no LED displays, at least Chrysler is still committed to presenting its line-up.  Not sure if it was ever in the works, but notably absent is heavily funded Tesla.

Last week TechCrunch announced the rumored sale of European price comparison shopping site Kelkoo for less than 100 million euros to investment group Jamplant Ltd.  The sale was notable given Yahoo unloaded the site for 375 million euros less than what it paid for it in 2004.  But who exactly is Jamplant?

Most media bytes on the transaction describe Jamplant as a private equity firm.  However this suggests some transaction history and possibly other portfolio companies.  The only available info on Jamplant is that the Group consists of several angel investors interested in the price comparison shopping space (talk about narrow), so who know’s what the full story is. Either way, have to credit Jamplant for executing a private equity deal in these turbulent times.  Just wonder if their name will emerge attached to another.

Taking a cue from Forbes 2008 list of America’s largest private companies, see below a list of America’s largest private companies backed by private equity.

No shock most of the companies below were acquired between 2005 and 2007.   Despite the size of many of the transactions, it’s interesting less than half (11/25) represent club deals.

Bloomberg is reporting that Cerberus Capital would be willing to forgo any profits from a future sale of troubled portfolio company Chrysler should the federal government pull the trigger and bailout the auto industry.

Given Chrysler’s private-owner status, CEO Bob Nardelli is hoping the offer elminates questions of unfair gains for Cerberus should government assistance give the company time to turn things around.

If a bailout does go through, this will mark a full circle for Chrysler, which would enjoy its second bailout in the last thirty years.  This time around however, it will need to rebound under private equity ownership which will be a true test for Nardelli.

Even if Robert is able to perform a successful turnaround, no doubt he won’t be looking at the upper end of his orginal compensation package.  The new best-case scenario for Cerberus is a free lesson in the US auto business.

Vacation rental listing provider HomeAway, Inc. just announced it has raised an additional $250 million in minority financing as the company continues to look for growth and consolidate the online vacation listing industry.  Since its formation in 2005 with an initial $49 million raise, (and subsequent $160 million round in 2006), HomeAway has gone on a buying spree, snapping up 11 vacation listing sites including VacationRentals.com and biggie VRBO.com.  HomeAway now claims more than 300,000 lisitings worldwide.

What’s interesting is that The WSJ makes out the investment as if it’s some sort of gamble on a new start-up, describing how new investors are essentially “betting $250 million that consumers will still use Web sites like HomeAway.com to find vacation-rental properties”.  Let’s be honest, this is a vote of confidence investment in the consolidation strategy of highly profitable and growing websites.  The real bet isn’t on the industry or business model, but rather if additional reasonably priced acquisitions are out there and if an intense marketing push can further grow HomeAway’s share of the market.

People tend to visit sites with the most listings and HomeAway appears to have acquired all the online pioneers and current market leaders in the vacation listing marketplace.  HomeAway’s most notable investment was 2006’s $160 million purchase of VRBO, a site that has now been around for thirteen years and in itself claims over 100,000 listings.  The only real current threat is a free listing site such as Craigslist which works great as a classified site for one-time posts, but is set-up poorly as a directory for users who need continual exposure.

Investors are showing they like what HomeAway has done with the first $200 million, essentially cobbling together a high-margin, $100 million business consisting entirely of recurring revenue and feel a further $250 million will corner the industry.  Todd Chaffee, General Partner of investment participant Institutional Venture Partners says the amount of financing is meant to serve as a “statement of ‘game over’” for competitors.  Proceeds are reportedly to be used for overseas acquisitions and to pay down debt.

The real question isn’t whether the business is sound, it’s whether the round’s investors are getting in at a fair valuation.   Hybrid venture capital / private equity firm Technology Crossover Ventures, who is reportedly committing $175 million of the $250 million raise must think so.  However, TechCrunch is reporting the new round has a lofty pre-money valuation of approximately $1.15 billion.  At a multiple significantly higher than 10x revenue, you be the judge . . .

( . . . well at least according to professional bio info available in PEdatabase).

Everyone loves rankings and so to help satisfy demand, we thought we’d conduct informal searches of professional bios listed within Private Equity Database and look at which schools tend to deliver when it comes to placement within private equity.

As far as which universities to query, we decided to favor schools with strong graduate business programs and used the top 25 schools listed in US News’ 2008 Graduate Business School Report as a basis for creating the list.    Keep in mind that the list below is based on number of mentions with no distinction between graduate or undergraduate degrees.

Rank by # of Mentions in PEdatabase	School	Query
1	Harvard University	“harvard”
2	University of Pennsylvania	“university of pennsylvania”
3	Stanford University	“stanford”
4	University of Chicago	“university of chicago”
5	Northwestern University	“northwestern”
6	New York University	“new york university”, “nyu”
7	University of Virginia	“university of virginia”
8	Dartmouth College	“dartmouth”
9	Columbia University	“Columbia University”
10	Yale University	“yale”
11	Duke University	“duke”
12	University of Michigan	“university of michigan”
13	Cornell University	“cornell”
14	Georgetown University	“georgetown”
15	University of California, Los Angeles	“university of california” AND los angeles, “ucla”
16	University of California, Berkeley	“berkeley”
17	Massachusetts Institute of Technology	“massachusetts institute of technology”
18	University of Texas, Austin	“university of texas” AND austin
19	University of Southern California	“university of southern california”, “usc”
20	University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill	“university of north carolina” AND chapel
21	Indiana University	“indiana university”
22	Emory University	“emory”
23	University of Rochester	“univeristy of rochester”
24	Carnegie Mellon University	“carnegie mellon”
25	Arizona State University	“arizona state”

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The Blackstone Group released its third quarter earnings report this week in which investment write downs helped generate a new private equity term, that being negative revenue.  Currently, a third of Blackstone’s portfolio resides in red territory reflecting deals and valuations of a different time.

However, despite the troubling numbers, Blackstone hasn’t let up on making new investments.  So far in the second half of 2008, Blackstone has announced six new transactions, including four in the last two months.

See all of Blackstone’s YTD investments below.