Biopharma IB to Buyout PE
Incoming full-time analyst at a BB/EB in SF that focuses exclusively on biopharma coverage/m&a. I'm interested in exiting to buyout PE and was wondering if it would be possible to recruit for TMT buyout funds or would my options be restricted to Healthcare buyout? I know TMT PE would be a harder sell but given how early on-cycle is I imagine it would be easier to relay my interest in Tech by just reading about the industry. Would you recommend lateraling to Tech IB within a year and recruiting on-cycle the following year instead? Would love to hear any advice/anecdotes from people that have recruited for PE from a similar situation!
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someone help this guy out
I was also in a primarily biotech/pharma group in SF looking to exit to buyout PE. Ended up at a healthcare-focused MM, but it's exclusively a services shop so may as well be a different industry. I really only got push back from some of the headhunters, but didn't really have anyone comment in interviews (even when talking to non-healthcare firms). My group has also had no trouble getting interviews and exits at all types of non-healthcare places.
While lateraling may give you a slight advantage to your current position, I don't think it's worth the time and effort. Just make sure you have an airtight story with the headhunters about why TMT and why buyout in general. Practice this over and over and go into the chats with headhunters as if they're a real first round. If you make a good impression you can interview wherever you want. Also try hard to see if you can get some type of buyout staffing that you can speak to (even if it's only some pitch or strips that you can spin, i.e. talk about investment rationale of the targets and your thoughts on any potential transaction / make your own simple LBO and say that you built a preliminary model). Definitely less common, but still happens in pharma and you can use it to show the headhunters that you know what you're talking about and shouldn't be written off.
This is super helpful - thanks! From your experience, which BB/EBs (Healthcare) in SF tended to place best in buyout PE? From what I understand getting initial HH conversations is largely a function of your firm/group, school, etc so was curious about how different HC groups in SF ranked in terms of prestige/exit opps
Unfortunately I don't know enough info to be able to answer that. Also tough to compare because some SF healthcare groups do have analysts work across verticals. In my experience everyone will have the initial conversations (even if you don't get inbounds from the HH you can just email them yourself and set something up). Where things start to funnel is the selection for the first round of interviews. This will partly be a function of how you perform in the headhunter chats because they rank you in lists they send to their clients. This is also where firm/group/GPA matter the most.
This is great! Would you mind sharing which Headhunter firms in particular did you receive pushback from? were they focused on specific type of PE (MFs/UMM/MM)?
For whatever reason I got roasted by Ratio for lack of traditional sell-side sponsor M&A work. No matter what I said in the chat the headhunter kept reverting to this. I've maybe gotten two opportunities forwarded from them and no interviews, so I was definitely not thought highly of. A contributing factor could have been that this was one of my first meetings and I was probably not as polished as I should have been. No other big issues with other HHs, but a majority of them have touched on it.
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