“Invest in the World You Want to Live In”: Karmijn Kapitaal Co-Founder Talks Changing the Voice of Private Equity

When Cilian Jansen Verplanke co-founded a private equity firm in 2010 with her two female co-founders, she had two goals: to change the tone of private equity and to answer a question that had followed her for more than 20 years in finance—where are all the women?

What followed was the creation of Karmijn Kapitaal, a private equity firm that invests in Dutch SMEs led by diverse management teams both in gender and in leadership styles, with a particular focus on gender balance and sustainability.

Over time, the firm has grown organically, not only backing a significant number of female-led businesses but also building a team where women are strongly represented: a new, professional and powerful statement in the industry.

How Cilian’s Big Finance Career Planted a Seed for Diversity

After nearly two decades working within the investment arms of some of the Netherlands’ largest banks, including ABN AMRO, Cilian noticed a pattern.

Despite a landscape teeming with entrepreneurs of both sexes, the deal-making rooms remained remarkably homogeneous.

“In 20 years of working with investment banks and private equity arms, at the other side of the table, you never really saw female entrepreneurs or founders approaching private equity and always homogeneous male teams who came from money, seeking for money.”

Today, Verplanke and her team make up one of the firms reshaping the private equity playbook.

Not with grand gestures or glossy slogans, but with consistent, value-driven action by having a totally mixed investment team which is deal focused, searching for balanced leadership creating financial returns and impact. 

As a signatory of the United Nations Principles of Responsible Investment, Karmijn Kapitaal says it is committed to the “importance of sustainable investment”.

The company also believes in the power of combining different people, perspectives, priorities, and leadership visions.

“To us diversity goes beyond simply counting men and women or backgrounds. Years of experience have taught us how diversity can work, when it can lead to excellent teams and organisations. A shared vision is crucial,” the company website proudly states. 

A Different Kind of Capital

As you can gather, Karmijn Kapitaal probably isn’t your typical PE firm. It is led by a female majority (75% of partners are women), and its portfolio reflects a commitment to gender-diverse leadership. 

But, as Cilian explains, this was the product of having female leaders in the founding team in the first place. 

“We never set a KPI to have 70% of CEOs in our portfolio companies be women,” she says. “That just happened because of our strategy and our strong network.

“It happened sort of naturally but now it’s a total USP.”

But the firm’s ethos runs deeper than diversity statistics. It’s about tone.

Private equity can be seen as aggressive. During the course of our interview she explains how her company wanted to show that you can lead with connection.

From Law to Private Equity

Her own path into private equity investment was, as she puts it, “not so romantic.” A law graduate, she was encouraged to apply for a bank traineeship—“a well-paid university,” she jokes.

“My first placement was in Rotterdam and then I went to the investment bank in Amsterdam, ABN AMRO, and I never left that field,” she explains.

Her early years in corporate banking and investment arms with the likes of RaboBank taught her technical fluency, but it was the absence of women in the field that initially pushed her to build something of her own.

“We (her co-founders Désirée van Boxtel and Hadewych Cels) were wondering why with so many female entrepreneurs, so many diverse teams… Why can’t they come to private equity? Why haven’t we ever seen them? So this was the basis in the thinking that Karmijn Kapitaal was to be a female-led and founded company.”

Changing the Tone of Private Equity

That moment came in 2010, when Cilian and her co-founders launched Karmijn with the goal of supporting underrepresented entrepreneurs and rewriting the narrative of what PE could be.

They recently celebrated 15 years in business.

“I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. I thank the banks for what I’ve learned and for what they allowed me to do. But being an entrepreneur is really the best,” she explains of her reason to become a founder. 

Fifteen years on, Karmijn has established itself as a respected player in the mid-market space working with small-medium enterprises.

As their website boldly puts it: “You can get money anywhere. You will find involvement, support and responsibility at Karmijn. We believe that personal relationships are just as important as finance.”

This approach stands out in a private equity industry often perceived as dominated by aggressive deal-making, with media coverage that tends to emphasize the negative.

Which probably sometimes makes sense. And also: it’s the news. You’re not always going to hear about the fluffy private equity stories. 

“Our second target for Karmijn Kapitaal was that we wanted to change the tone of voice within private equity. It is very much seen as aggressive and short. So we said, ‘Let's do this business in a different voice for connecting.’”

So does this mean she thinks private equity has a reputation to improve?

“It’s a big question,” she says.

“It has a bad reputation sometimes but I don’t know whether the sector is always to be blamed. It’s also sometimes politicians who like to blame.

"They say that we have a bad sector and that it’s over-leveled with lots of debt and people grabbing profits. And I think that’s not the case.”

Cilian emphasizes that one of private equity’s biggest strengths is the number of jobs it supports.

For example, according to Invest Europe, PE and VC-backed companies employ approximately 748,211 employees in the Netherlands. 

“If you look at the Netherlands for example, 15% of GDP is established by private equity owned companies.

“You know,  we have 18 million people living in the Netherlands of which 9 million work. About 800,000 of them are in PE owned companies.

"So you cannot say it is a bad sector because it has an important influence. But what could change is transparency. People do not always know what is going on.”

How the Karmijn Kapitaal Approach Attracts LPs

Karmijn Kapitaal has steadily attracted a mix of international LPs and family offices. 

As Cilian, co-founder and managing partner, puts it: “It started a bit with curiosity about the female-led thing.

“There are not many GPs that are female founded and female led, already for 15 years.

But once potential LPs dig deeper, what keeps them engaged is more than that: experience and results.

“They want to know what’s different about us, what really sets us apart,” she says. “But at the end of the day it’s all about your track record, of course. So if you combine a track record with a good investment strategy, that’s what I think is attractive about Karmijn.”

Private Equity with a Partnership Mindset

So what does it take for a PE investor to truly be a partner to a fast-growing SME?

“A lot of what we do aligns with the standard work you’d expect in private equity, leveraging knowledge, network, and skills, to let the company grow in value.

"But what is probably a differentiator is our ability to build strong relationships and create genuine connections.“

"This often leads to deals being granted to us based on trust. That trust—being seen as a reliable and valued shareholder—is what I believe differentiates us.”

The Karmijn Kapitaal team works closely with founders and management teams, even during transitions like management buyouts.

What key lessons are there to be learned in these situations?

“Well, if there is a management buyout, for example, and the former owner is stepping out, you really have to establish what their entrepreneurial skills are because management teams are not always able to think of Plan B, C, D.

“You have to think about the right energy but also the right skills in the right place for that transition.”

The Drive for Impact Investment in Private Equity

For Cilian, the conversation around impact investing often feels like an ongoing battle between intention and execution. 

As she reflects on the landscape of private equity, she acknowledges a growing trend among Limited Partners — more and more are seeking investments that align with values, not just only financial returns.

But there's a catch.

“We've been making sustainability reports for years,” she says. “We do this because we genuinely want to establish something authentic within these companies. But then we write it all down, bring in consultants, and send it off to LPs... and hardly anyone reacts.”

Still, she sees hope. There’s a trend emerging.

For example, pension funds and other investors are beginning to recognize the importance of climate change and social impact. 

“We’re seeing more and more LPs paying acknowledgment to climate and social impact, not just the numbers at the bottom of the balance sheet,” she says.

That awareness  is starting to show up in real capital flows and not just good intentions.

“You see total buckets of money going into impact investing. That is different from ten years ago when the word was not even invented yet. I think it’s also becoming more clear that you can make good financial returns even when making an impact at the same time. Impact is about resilience, about creating long term sustainability. 

“I truly believe it is a necessity because how else can we go on in this world? So I say, invest in the world you want to live in.”

A Call for the Future Generation in Private Equity

Cilian Jansen Verplanke and her co-founders didn’t set out to make noise but they wanted change.

Fifteen years in, Karmijn Kapitaal proves that private equity doesn’t have to live up to some people’s worst assumptions—extractive, impersonal, or closed-off. It can look entirely different.

It can be and is thoughtful, inclusive, and deeply human.

By putting relationships on par with returns, and purpose alongside profit, Karmijn offers a compelling example for what private equity can look like at its best.  

So what message does Cilian have for founders, GPs, and LPs who want to build the future of the industry?

“You need to get those young females into the sector. Retain them once you have them: so have family leave policies and let them feel safe.

"They're just as bright, just as smart, they have all the same backgrounds and studies. But also promote them. This would be my message.”

At Vestlane, we believe in this future too. We’re also building the infrastructure to support a new generation of fund managers and investors.

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