Wednesday was the last day of summer, and I sweltered in Detroit as temperatures hit the 80s. It was also the day the “motor city” saw one of its more bizarre killings, even in this capital of gun crime. A taxi drove erratically for some distance along the freeway before veering off, the driver dead at the wheel. If you are one of our hipper readers, I’m sure you won’t be fazed by the term “8 Mile Road”. Eminem chose this as the title of his rap movie due to the symbolic significance of the road that divides Detroit from its northern suburbs Let’s just say it’s not prime real estate. For many, it’s a sad price to pay for someone else’s bountiful return.a.townsend independent.co.ukJason Niss?s away. Rightly or wrongly, they complain of cost cuts, suppliers’ terms being toughened up, attitudes and atmospheres hardening and workloads increasing.

Taken private by CVC, Texas Pacific and Merrill Lynch, it is being readied for a return to the market, which should make them a healthy profit. But talking to insiders at Debenhams, I found a sadness about what has happened to a company once held up as a paradigm of retail excellence. But negotiations with British Airways dragged on, and the workforce did not take kindly to being overhauled.The fact is, private equity firms are not always the nicest face of capitalism Look, for example, at Debenhams. Texas Pacific took on a loss-making company, intending to renegotiate contracts and overhaul labour practices, thereby turning it around.

A chief executive who doesn’t run a tight ship gets all he deserves.But private equity does have its downsides. For a start, there is a question of accountability: they may be buying major companies, but their world is a private one.And when things go wrong, boy can they go wrong Look at Gate Gourmet. But just because deals weren’t being done, it didn’t mean that all that cash which private equity funds had raised was going to disappear overnight.And so these firms started looking for ways to spend their money. Retail was a favoured area, and a number of chains disappeared from the market as private equity firms did what they do best: spotting undervalued businesses where they could go in, strip out costs, bolster performance and then get out again, at a profit.There is, of course, nothing wrong with this.

But apparently not.It was not a great week, all in all, for any of the three But they surely cannot be surprised at the flak. They, and others like them, may well relish the fame and trappings associated with television appearances, may revel in being the names laymen know in an otherwise non-descript sea of City suits. But as any celeb of long standing will tell you, the higher the profile, the bigger the dent to reputations when things fail to go as planned.Behind closed doorsSo, private equity is leading the way in the UK’s mergers and acquisitions boom, outstripping straightforward corporate deals for the first time.It is not that surprising. The collapse of the tech bubble saw deals off all sorts fall away, and many an investor was burnt.