Palo Alto, CA, February 15, 2011 — Altamont Capital Partners (Altamont), the San Francisco Bay area-based middle market private equity firm, announced today that Lionel Conacher has joined the firm as a Senior Advisor. Mr. Conacher will focus primarily on investment opportunities in Canada.

Jesse Rogers, Managing Director of Altamont, commented: “We are thrilled to welcome Lionel to our team. His combination of operating experience, complementary industry expertise, local market knowledge and extensive relationship network will help us immensely in extending our reach into the Canadian business community. We believe the region presents significant opportunities for our investment strategy.”

Mr. Conacher grew up in and spent the bulk of his professional career in Canada. Most recently he was President and Chief Operating Officer of Thomas Weisel Partners (TWP), the San Francisco-headquartered investment bank. He joined TWP in 2008 from Westwind Partners, a boutique institutional investment bank based in Toronto, which he co-founded in 2002 and led as President and Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Conacher grew Westwind, which focused on the energy, mining, and TMT sectors, to $100 million in revenue and 100 people and led the sale of the firm to TWP in 2007. Previously, Mr. Conacher worked for Citigroup, Hees International Bancorp (now Brookfield Asset Management) and First Marathon Securities (now National Bank Financial).

Mr. Conacher added: “I feel fortunate to join this premier group of investors. The Altamont team has an outstanding track record of successfully pursuing complicated and change-intensive middle market investment opportunities. I’m confident that together we offer a unique blend of skills and experience and that we will find numerous attractive opportunities to invest with Canadian businesses.”

ABOUT ALTAMONT CAPITAL PARTNERS

Altamont Capital Partners is a private equity firm based in the San Francisco Bay area with $500 million in capital, focused on investing in change-intensive middle market businesses. The firm’s principals have significant experience building business success stories across a range of industries and transaction types. Altamont is particularly drawn to companies which are constrained for some reason from realizing their full potential. The firm seeks to work in partnership with management to implement strategic and operational change. Altamont is a generalist firm with deep experience in several verticals including business services, financial services, industrials, healthcare, consumer and retail.

For further information:
Brunswick Group on behalf of Altamont
Carol Roos 415 671 7480 (o) 415 309 1341 (c)