You’ve seen a lot of places that were historically in the ~$5Bn fund size range raise monster $10Bn+ funds in recent years (think Genstar, GTCR, BDT, Clearlake, Platinum, CD&R, NMC, Veritas among others). How many of these are a product of a favorable fundraising environment vs. real, long-term differentiation / advantage? Where would you want to stake your career long term?
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CD&R most likely to stay and increase/maintain fund size out of those names
Veritas is pretty differentiated with the government angle
CD&R has been around for a long time - best chance of sticking around. Platinum competes in less competitive segment of the PE market so they’ll be around. Veritas has a sector niche so decent.
I think Clearlake and Genstar are the “AARKs” of PE world. Great timing. Ultimately unclear externally why they have a sustainability competitive moat.
BDT has pretty severe key man risk - the business is completely built upon and contingent on the guy’s reputation and relationships.
I think platinum may downsize, 15bn is insane for their strategy
Agree platinum’s fund is big for the strategy. However, they should be better suited to the investment environment over the next few years.
Currently recruiting for BDT and candidly this seems like a big risk to me. If both Byron and Buffet eventually kick the can, what's the moat of the firm? Just a merchant bank with esoteric deal history.
FT or SA?
Every private equity fund has "key man risk". It's just that some firms are further in the process of transition than others with varying degrees of success (Jon Gray at BX was smooth; Kewsong at Carlyle and Marc at Apollo were rockier). I had a few friends from my analyst class exit to BDT a few years back and they seem to be really enjoying their time so far. If the risk was truly that great, I'd highly doubt they'd have the retention levels they enjoy now. Given that they're clearly a premier firm with a $10B+ fund, you'd definitely have a leg up over your peers in banking if you were to choose to recruit out of there assuming you get an offer
PM me
How far along are you in the process?
Too me Genstar and nmc seem a bit unsustainable. Great returns, fantastic rep but at the end of the day they are mm funds. Either will have to deploy capital more rapidly on sub optimal investments or go bigger which has not been their core territory. Also seem like they have a pretty standard buy and build strategy. BDT has key man risk.
Veritas has insane sector focus will be fine, CD@R candidly not in the same bucket and has always been much larger.
so overall would be most worried about Genstar and nmc. Think they have also benefitted a lot from insane tech run which will likely at least somewhat subside
Bump
Clearlake by far. Zero regard for multiples. Overpaid for everything.
Most interesting one to watch for the next 3-5 year forsure
Any thoughts on Francisco Partners?
Riding the tech wave same as Thoma/Vista/etc, no one knows if they’re actually differentiated or not. We’ll find out in about 3-5 years if they’re actually smart or not when we see how the current fund performs, but they timed their fundraise well so they have a big pile of money currently. Will be interesting to see how those returns hold up with tech taking a hit, their returns until now have been super impressive
Hhhhh
What’s the issue with Permira? This seems to be common wisdom now but no one seems to be able to say what they’ve done wrong, so I’m trying to figure that out
I was just joking around. Permira is a global megafund with fantastic returns and a true MF in every sense of the word. Not sure why there are random people shitting on it on this forum but I would take it over pretty much any fund in a heartbeat.
Great returns, good culture and very interesting deals.
Why do you say the jordan company is unsustainable? Just raised $5B for new fund
Bump
Have heard anecdotally from bankers and PE peers that Clearlake has signed docs with quarter-filled VDRs and minimal diligence.
In my experience, Clearlake comes in late to a process when everyone else has done their diligence. They get access to all the diligence already done and can point to a number on their end and then we can figure out if they're in the hunt pretty quickly. Saves all of us some time, especially them.
What diligence do they “get access to”? It’s just raw data room files you still need to hire your own qoe consultant legal tear through vdr do calls etc you can’t just roll in like that …..
Can you elaborate a bit more on their investment process? Curious to hear.
My understanding is that Genstar doesn’t diligence as hard?
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