A necessary wall

French asset management group Tikehau this week announced it had bought a 35 percent stake in Duke Street Capital. The move raised eyebrows at first at Private Debt Investor HQ, as Tikehau has a well-established private debt arm. Did this mean Duke Street, which switched to a deal-by-deal funding model last year, would solve its debt funding riddle? One concern with a deal-by-deal model is that wedded to the time it takes to put together a debt financing package, you also have to pull together an equity syndicate too. Would Tikehau Investment Management (the French group's debt segment) get first refusal on a string of Duke Street buyouts?