Wimbledon is better known for lawn tennis than leveraged buy-outs, but Lionhart, a hedge fund based in the south London suburb, hopes to change this image as it seeks to raise at least $500m for its debut private equity fund.

The diversification of Lionhart, which has offices in Wimbledon as well as the Cayman Islands, Toronto, New York and Singapore, underlines the increasingly blurred lines between hedge funds and private equity.