Designing a pathway into direct private equity investing
STRATEGIC ADVISORY
Context
A well-established investment office was successfully running a fund-of-funds mandate. Both the Principals and key Executives expressed interest in allocating a portion of the portfolio for direct investing. They wanted to capitalise on the team’s existing strengths and its network of industry relationships, while navigating the inherent differences between the two styles of investing.
Work
To guide this transition, our Partner worked with a sub-group of Board members and key executives. The first step was to articulate the non-negotiable aspects of their target approach into a “design checklist” for the new concept.
Using proprietary research – supplemented by interviews with leading family-backed PE firms – we led a series of workshops to define the target strategy and investment governance framework, and clarify the implications for the team and their incentives for the target model.
Impact
The new strategy went through a series of approval forums, leading to full buy-in from both the Board and the Principals. The new approach would play out over 5-10 years. A material budget and capital commitment were made to the new strategy, and the green light was given to move to execution phase.