Harris Williams - Dealflow and reputation?

dealflow: Very good. 2/3 of their pitches turn into deals, and as an analyst only like 15-20% of your time will be spent on pitching. Pretty impressive if you ask me.

reputation: Tops in the middle-market.

Two-thirds Mark Klein? That's a pretty crazy success rate from what I've heard is normal for banks, even smaller ones that target specific types of deals.

They are a very well-respected middle market bank. 2/3rd might be a little high but I heard it's above 50%...

I've heard you basically can get into any 800mm of less PE fund after your time there

HW is an excellent choice if you want to work in the middle market. It won't get you into KKR, but as waltersobchek said, you have an open invite to most PE shops.

Any idea on compensation? Comparable to bulge?

Base comp is around 55k-56k - not sure on bonus, but I know it is below street generally. Trade off is Richmond is pretty damn cheap, although I didn't really like the city all that much.

Any idea how far below street the bonus is?

Also, any additional comp for San Francisco over Richmond?

like others have mentioned, they're very well-respected in the middle market. they run very good processes and they're able to get some pretty rich valuations on their deals as a result. i know PE firms (mine included) talk about how tough it is to win a HW deal simply because the multiples are too rich, but i guess from an analyst's perspective, this is the type of work you want to be doing if you're looking to get into the middle market.

something to keep in mind at the analyst level - it seems like they do primarily sellside M&A. while this is definitley helpful in the transition to PE, it doesn't sound like they do much or any buyside m&a at all. i'm still in school, but had offers from HW, and chose another bank primarily for this reason, as I felt that I could get more exposure to different products and whatnot.

Don't know much about the SF office, but the MDs/Directors in Richmond are actually really cool.

know a few people that work in the regional offices. base is 60k in sf and boston. bonuses last year and this year were slightly higher than street, believe it or not. hours also not as bad.

Hillarious. Mark Klein MD For Prez all da' wayyyyy

ideating and Alphaholic ... Mark Klein's statement is actually pretty accurate. I know a lot of analysts at Harris Williams and they are almost never pitching.

I have a friend who went there this summer. Smart guy but he isn't all put together. He did aweful in BB interviews and I guess once all the competition was out of the market he got a job there. That's kind of how I see the place.

BB scraps

No, you're mistunderstanding. It's funny because mark klein, be he parody or whatever, is actually providing solid information. No back-handed advice, no insult or snide remarks.

Shocking

Whoops. Sarcasm is hard to sort out on the internet.

mark kleinnnnnn

good info, Indeed. do you know anything about which specific offices have the highest deal flow? I'm really interested in HW, and would like to know which office is their most active one.

I know PNC acquired Harris Williams a few years back --- is it just a loose affiliation or what (being that both have their own HR groups, etc)?

Gorilla, if you take a look at their recent press releases, most of the deals are being led out of the Richmond office. Not too surprising given that is the headquarters. My buddies in their Boston office are kept busy though, so it may just be a size thing.

Pretty sure all their offices are busy right now, but that's just a guess. The guys I know are all out of Richmond, and I know that office does well. Both the Boston and San Fran offices have been around a while--through ups and downs--so I feel like if they were incapable of generating adequate deal flow they wouldn't be around anymore.

And yeah, thus far the PNC relationship is arms length, from what I've seen and heard. I really don't know how much origination they've got out of it and vice versa. HW has their own HR, at least as far as their recruiting goes, so don't bother contacting PNC directly if you're looking for a job at HW.

Does anyone know what a post-mba associate pulls in at HW? I'm guessing its definitely below the street but how far and does it compare to DC MM firms like ACAS or Allied?

bump, I'm interested in any info on associates?

sf office. their base was on par with street. bonuses were a bit higher. hours were a hell of a lot better too. cant say it would be the same for associates. prob would be a tradeoff between lifestyle and pay.

Deal flow is strong across all offices; however, I think the deal flow is strongest in Richmond given it has the most MDs. As far as compensation goes they pay equivalent or higher than the street. I think base 70k for analyst, bonuses very comp. / equivalent to BB.

I've heard nothing but good things about the company.

talked to a director at a networking thing couple weeks ago...he said they are all sell side and the only buy side they do is advising regular clients from time to time (or something like that, sorry not the most expert on the subject)

Bad thing about HW is the location. Ew at richmond!

Read this:

IDD Magazine

Harris Williams Has Aspirations in Europe

M&A boutique filling London office with European pros to establish a beachhead, serve the middle market and expand into new areas

By Ken Tarbous December 17, 2009

Middle-market investment banking boutique Harris Williams & Co. opened a London office as part of an effort to capture what it expects will be a pickup in European cross-border M&A activity.

The company joins other boutique firms like Moelis & Co. and Houlihan Lokey that have opened doors overseas to capture market share at the expense of large investment banks.

Thierry Monjauze, who was recently brought in from Deutsche Bank by Harris Williams, will spearhead the expansion. He is a managing director and head of the Richmond, Va., firm's European business.

The London office will focus on technology and new media M&A as well as other verticals, Monjauze says. Harris Williams has six professionals already working at the new location and it expects to grow that to a dozen by the end of next year. "As we build the office we will naturally think about the areas where we are strong in the U.S. We think most of the activity will be in Europe, and we hope that will be the perfect strategy," says Monjauze, a technology banker.

Supplemented by Harris Williams' 160 bankers in the U.S., the London office hopes to land more work in the areas of private placements, divestitures of businesses within public companies, as well as advisory assignments related to capital markets and IPOs.

It is common in Europe for independent firms to act by behalf of a company or its shareholders in helping select banks that are best positioned to help the company go public, says Monjauze.

London will be the seventh location for Harris Williams, a unit of PNC Financial Services Group of Pittsburgh that was started up 18 years ago.

In addition to Richmond, other offices are in Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Boston, Cleveland and San Francisco.

In its nearly two-decade history, the boutique has focused on the sell side and worked on a range of verticals, including industrials, building products, and transport and logistics. But the London effort looks to expand Harris Williams' reach both geographically and in its scope of business.

The boutique has closed deals in Europe since its inception in 1991 and has partnered with other firms when there was a local emphasis.

Monjauze, who has 14 years of investment banking experience, has worked in London since 2002, most recently as co-head of European technology investment banking at Deutsche Bank.

Born in France, he studied in the U.S. and received a master's at Stanford. Monjauze founded a software- and services-focused venture capital fund prior to joining Deutsche. He also oversaw the European software and Internet groups at Credit Suisse First Boston.

Monjauze says the boutique bank is recruiting and hiring only professionals who know the European landscape, rather than trying to transplant bankers from the U.S. to a new home.

"It takes a long time to get accustomed to the client base, the various cultures, the various regulatory cultures. Europe is many countries. I've seen people have trouble adjusting, and bankers go back to the U.S. If success is tied to knowing the private-equity groups and venture-capital groups, having worked in Europe makes a huge difference," Monjauze says.

The vast talent pool of professionals in Europe both displaced by the economic downturn and those looking to move out of larger investment banking firms has enabled the boutique to find bankers who fit well into its culture.

"We didn't believe that moving a bunch of Harris Williams people over there was the right move. We took people who are local and are seasoned and knew the market and it gives them the ability to grow something," says Harris Williams' co-founder Hiter Harris 3rd.

Other investment banking boutiques have sprung up in London and elsewhere in Europe as well as Asia in recent years, but the firm's founder is nonplussed by the competition.

"We probably couldn't have done this a few years ago when the market was hot. We would have found difficulty finding talent. With the market hitting the bottom, the talent available in the marketplace is unbelievable. We never could have attracted these talented people in a past market," Harris says.

Long-time Harris Williams client, private-equity firm The Riverside Company, has engaged the boutique on a number of deals in the U.S. and in Europe.

Bela Szigethy, Riverside co-CEO, says the move has been a long time coming for Harris Williams, but it will take some work to make the effort succeed.

"They're clearly one of the best middle-market buyout firms in North America. The one time they worked on an exit with us in Europe, on their own out of North America, they did an outstanding job," Szigethy says. "It'll be a challenge. There's a lot of tough competition in Europe. Starting from scratch is never easy. It will take a while for them to compete with firms who have been there for a while, including the local firms."

A major reason behind the new office is Harris Williams' expectation that the European cross-border M&A market is primed for more activity in the coming year. The firm's professionals see a lot of pent-up demand; capital on the sidelines needs to be put to work and business owners who held back from selling amid the height of the credit storm are ready to bring their companies to market.

"We really do see things improving both here and in the European market. We've been around long enough that we've seen four or five of these cycles in the M&A world," Harris says.

"Everything is getting more global, and the trend is growing for the middle market, where truly any company in the world can do a deal with any other company in the world. We think the London office is very material for us — we've always had great global reach, but having our own people in London really gives us a launching pad for the rest of the world."

When it comes to advisory work in the U.S., Harris Williams appears to have been busy in the final three months of this year. So far this quarter Harris Williams has advised Barker Co. on its sale to Hill Phoenix Inc., a subsidiary of Dover Corp., and it also advised Sunoco Inc. on the sale of its retail heating oil and propane distribution business to Superior Plus Corp. Another mandate involved advising Yuba Heat Transfer on its pending sale to SPX subsidiary SPX Heat Transfer Inc.

Meanwhile, many market participants say they are not surprised that banking boutiques have made inroads or are looking to build a business overseas.

"We're seeing a trend. The bulge-bracket firms became global many years ago," says Stewart Kohl, co-CEO of Riverside.

With London as its beachhead in Europe, the firm has an eye to Asia and other markets.

"We're going to consider expansion past London, for sure, but we're focused on getting the office to a critical mass, a size that we want," Harris says. "I'm sure after that we'll consider offices in other geographic localities."

Find out more information about people mentioned in this article from our People Database:

H. Hiter Harris III Bela Szigethy Stewart Kohl

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