Silversmith doubles up to invest Fund I

Silversmith Capital Partners, which launched earlier this year, has hired four new team members at its Boston office, managing partner Jim Quagliaroli told Private Equity International.

The growth equity firm has appointed Marc Munfa as principal, Brian Peterson and Srikant Rao as vice presidents and Nikhil Marathe as a senior associate.

Munfa served for three years at growth equity firm JMI Equity as vice president focusing on software companies. He began his career as an analyst at Morgan Stanley Real Estate and associate at Morgan Stanley Private Equity.

Peterson was formerly vice president at Sterling Partners, where he covered mainly healthcare services, and was an associate at Metalmark Capital and an analyst at Lazard.

Rao was most recently senior director of advertising products at salesforce.com, where he had also been an executive director of strategy. Prior to that, Rao was an associate covering technology at TA Associates and analyst at Jefferies.

Marathe comes to Silversmith from TA Associates, where he was an investment associate for three years covering healthcare services and IT. Before that he was an analyst at Evercore and a summer analyst at Credit Suisse, according to his LinkedIn profile.

“At all levels, we’re involved with sourcing new investment opportunities, diligence and leading investments,” Quagliaroli told PEI. “We very much look at [these four individuals] as deal quarterbacks who can manage the investment process and will be working closely with managing partners.”

Last month when Silversmith was a team of four, Quagliaroli told PEI that he expects the firm to grow to 14 or 15 individuals by first half of 2016.

“I think we’re certainly trending toward that goal, which will be a good number for us for Fund I,” he said. “We’ve made four hires that we’re very excited about but we’re actively seeking to hire associate candidates.”

He said the fund is actively looking for new growth investments in two core industry verticals of technology and healthcare.

Silversmith closed its debut fund on $460 million in the summer, surpassing its $350 million target, as reported by PEI.