Start up FO PE fund out of undergrad?

Hi guys, 
Fourth year university international student in Japan. I received an analyst offer from a new (1.2yrs) PE/VC fund that I have been interning at for 4 months. I also have the option to go to masters.

- The investment team has 7 members.
- Partner is an ex BCG Project leader. 
 - No VP yet.
- Senior associates and associates have experience at big law, MBB, MM and LMM IB, Big 4 and CFO experience in mid sized companies.
- Satisfied with the offered comp (Japan Big 4 consulting comp, most of the comp as base). 
- The target is the LMM consumer market, around $30m EV.
- Partner wants to leverage MBB experience to grow LMM portcos.
- The investment team can focus on the investment process because we have a full back office team.

- Partner priorities WLB and having a flat culture.

- Talks of carry but nothing concrete on the contract so I don't have much expectation here.

My concerns:
- Partner has no investment track record.
- The initial budget allocated by the family is very small. We are struggling to get a $16m deal over the line; having to propose a staged acquisition.
- The family wants to see results first before giving a larger budget. 
- 2 of the associates are adamantly telling me to reject the full time offer, go to masters instead and apply to big banks. 
- The 2 associates who are against me joining the firm are thinking of quitting.
- The 2 associates are pretty unhappy about the budget size. They say they were lied to about the budget during their interview.

-We can't use LBO because the family doesn't like taking on debt.

- We don't even have a fund raised. The family underwrites check on a case by case basis.

- Worried my exit opportunity will be abysmal.

Based on these concerns, I feel like it's best for me to go to masters and go elsewhere.

But I also know how hard it is to get a job in high finance in a foreign country as a non native so I feel like this is a rare opportunity. What do you guys suggest?

1 Comments
 

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