Ralf Flore

Ralf Flore is the founder and a Managing Partner of Ufenau Capital Partners AG, a privately owned Swiss investor group headquartered on Lake Zurich (Huobstrasse 3, CH-8808 Pfäffikon SZ). He has more than 30 years of experience in private equity and corporate management. He began his career in the private equity division of UBS (Warburg Dillon Read) in Zurich, and before founding Ufenau he led a publicly listed investment company with offices in Frankfurt and Zurich for several years. His earlier career spanned senior roles associated with private-equity houses active in the German-speaking region, including firms such as Heliad Equity Partners, Go Equity, Swiss Life Private Equity Partners and Capvis Equity Partners, where he focused on growth and buy-out transactions.

He studied Business Administration at the University of Applied Sciences in Constance (HTWG Konstanz), having started his professional life with commercial training in the German Mittelstand (mid-sized business sector) — a background that maps directly onto Ufenau's focus on owner-managed service companies.

Under Flore's leadership, Ufenau has grown into a significant European mid-market player. The firm advises capital of over €5bn and runs a buy-and-build model centered on platform companies. As of mid-2026 its portfolio comprised roughly 26 platform companies generating about €2.8bn in sales and €450m in EBITDA. Ufenau's team combines financial partners with operating "entrepreneur partners" — for example former Adecco CEO Dieter Scheiff (co-Managing Partner) and long-time healthcare executive Andreas Joehle.

• Invests in established, profitable service companies in the small/mid-cap segment — not startups or seed-stage businesses.
• Executes a buy-and-build strategy: acquires a "platform" company in a fragmented service niche, then scales it through numerous add-on acquisitions. In 2025 alone Ufenau completed 52 acquisitions (three platforms plus 49 add-ons).
• Sector concentration in five service verticals: Business Services, IT Services, Education & Lifestyle Services, Healthcare Services, and Financial Services.
• Geographic reach across German-speaking Europe (its core), Iberia, Poland, Benelux, and the UK, supported by an office in Madrid alongside its Swiss base.
• Positions itself as an entrepreneurial, hands-on partner to founders and owner-managers, frequently backing succession situations and pairing capital with operating partners drawn from industry.
• Backs strategies with large, quickly raised funds — Ufenau VIII closed at its €2.1bn hard cap in about four months in 2025, more than doubling the €1.055bn Ufenau VII (2022), signaling strong LP demand for the model.