Ever since Permira raised €11bn (£9.5bn) for a new private equity fund two years ago, the group has been one of the continent’s highest profile buy-out operations.

Now Permira has offered to return as much as €1.5bn of undrawn capital back to investors, it is again in the spotlight, just as it was when unions last year targeted Damon Buffini, the group’s chairman, over job cuts. Both times, Permira would have preferred to avoid the attention.