Europe’s richest person, Bernard Arnault, built his fortune on designer handbags and Champagne. His latest bet: security guards.

Last week, Arnault’s private venture arm and family office, Aglaé Ventures, participated in a $12 million fundraise for Belfry, a startup that handles logistics such as billing for security firms, alongside two co-investors. Aglaé’s portfolio also includes Airbnb and Netflix.

The round marks a busy month for high-net-worth families looking to diversify. Since Jan. 1, single-family offices have made at least 24 such investments, according to data provided exclusively to CNBC by Fintrx, a private wealth intelligence platform. The dollar amounts of the investments aren’t disclosed.

Here are five noteworthy deals this month by family offices with at least $5 billion in assets:

Artificial intelligence startups continue to capture investors’ attention. Indian tech billionaire Azim Premji took part in a $141 million round for Hippocratic AI, a startup building an AI agent for health-care providers. His family office, Premji Invest, previously co-led the unicorn’s Series A in March with General Catalyst.

Health care proved popular with other family offices in January. Horizons Ventures, the firm of Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing, invested in a recent $27 million round for Owlstone Medical, which is developing a breathalyzer to diagnose diseases. Horizons has backed Owlstone since 2018 and has at least three other portfolio companies devoted to improving diagnostics.

Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective participated in a $100 million fundraise for immunotherapy startup Umoja Biopharma. The same week, Emerson announced it had co-led a $10 million round for at-home cervical cancer test maker Teal Health alongside Forerunner. Emerson’s oncology investments are managed by Yosemite, a spinoff firm run by Powell Jobs’ son Reed.

Most of the top family-office dealmakers are relatively young, founded by principals who are still living. However, one notable single-family office making an acquisition this month, Bessemer Investors, comes from old money. Late patriarch Henry Phipps Jr. was a business partner of steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. He formed multiple firms to preserve the family’s wealth after Carnegie Steel was sold to financier J.P. Morgan for $480 million in 1901 —what would be $18 billion today.

Bessemer Investors manages the Phipps family’s private equity portfolio, targeting industrial companies. Through Tencarva, a pump provider the firm has backed since 2021, Bessemer has acquired four other industrial firms. The latest acquisition, Detroit Pump & Mfg. Co., closed this month for an undisclosed amount.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/01/31/family-office-investing-january-arnault-laurene-powell-jobs-premji.html