June 2010 Issue

Founders need heirs, and yet many founders of major private equity firms have yet to designate heirs apparent. PEI asked market participants to identify key next-generation leaders who seem poised to, if not take over their firms, continue to be entrusted with major responsibilities while the founders ponder succession plans

Rubbing shoulders with some of private equity’s most influential individuals, Amanda Janis finds GPs and LPs feeling good about the future … mostly.

PEI has awarded Oaktree’s Howard Marks its Private Equity Leader Award.

Blackstone has started to assign ‘nurse advocates’ to higher risk employees as part of its portfolio-wide healthcare programme. By Jennifer Harris and Chris Witkowsky

Pantheon Ventures has a shiny new management structure backing its $4bn in dry powder. PEI catches up with one of the world’s largest fund of funds managers.

Buyouts are back in the UK, but leading industry figures question whether recent growth can be sustained. Tom Bawden reports.

Ian Davis – McKinsey’s former worldwide managing director – will advise Apax chief Martin Halusa on the firm’s global expansion.

An increase on CGT seems inevitable, but the silver lining in the UK may be government stability and possible asset sales.

The fates of three of Europe’s most significant leveraged buyouts done in the past market cycle – EMI, Alliance Boots and Gala Coral – show just how diverse the fortunes of boom-era deals can be.

Three veterans of Central and Eastern European private equity gathered in Poland’s capital to assess the damage wrought by the crisis and consider how the industry now moves forward.

CalPERS’ well-liked private equity chief, Leon Shahinian, has been placed on administrative leave after allegedly failing to disclose gifts and travel from a placement agent. ‘We get these offers all the time’, says one fellow LP who described Shahinian as a ‘good man’.

Why the emerging appetite for secondary buyouts in Asia may not become widespread.

Scott Sperling of Thomas H Lee Partners shares his views on the state of the private equity industry and developments at THL.