Korean PEF leaders armed with global mindset
Overseas experience helpful in attracting investors
By Park Jae-hyuk
Fundraising is one of the most important tasks for executives of private equity funds (PEFs) worldwide, because their companies need a large sum of money to start investing.
Given that they rely heavily on personal networks when raising money from foreign investors, overseas experience and a global mindset are essential for PEF leaders, who ply their business across the globe.
This is no exception for the Korean private equity industry.
Most leaders of prominent PEFs here were educated in other countries or worked at foreign firms.
“Overseas experience is quite common for participants in the private equity market,” a capital market insider said. “This is because they have wider personal networks and are accustomed to advanced investment strategies.”
MBK Partners Chairman Kim Byung-ju is a typical example.
The man who leads Asia's largest independent PEF earned a bachelor from Haverford College and an MBA from Harvard Business School (HBS), after moving to the United States at the age of 10.
He then built a career on Wall Street.
After working for several years at Goldman Sachs, Kim served as the president of Carlyle Asia Partners, responsible for overseeing the U.S. PEF's buyout activities in the Asia-Pacific region, except Japan.
In 2005, he founded MBK Partners with his Asian colleagues at Carlyle.
Based on the chairman's career, MBK has carried out its fundraising around the world.
“Our investors include government agencies, public and corporate pension funds, financial institutions, funds of funds and university endowments from China, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, North America, Western Europe and the Middle East,” the company states on its website.
Hahn & Company CEO Hahn Sang-won was also educated in the U.S.
Graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy and Yale University, he got an MBA from HBS.
He also worked at a foreign financial firm, serving as the managing director and chief investment officer for Morgan Stanley's Private Equity Group in Asia and the representative director of Morgan Stanley Private Equity Korea.
In 2010, Hahn and Chairman Yoon Yeo-eul, who led Sony Group Korea, founded Hahn & Company which has now become the nation's second-largest independent PEF.
Since its establishment, the PEF has attracted investments primarily from foreign limited partners.
According to industry sources, Hahn spends most of his time on meeting with such partners overseas.
“The CEO is involved in almost all decision-making regarding Hahn & Co.'s investments,” a capital market insider said.
IMM Private Equity CEO Song In-jun studied in Korea, unlike Kim and Hahn.
Graduating from a high school in Daejeon, he received a bachelor's and master's at Seoul National University's School of Business Administration.
Some people therefore regard him as the CEO of a “genuine” homegrown PEF.
But Song has also developed a global mindset, since he started his career at the multinational accounting firm Arthur Andersen, as a certified public accountant.
In addition to the heads of the top three buyout firms, many leaders of domestic PEFs have overseas experience.
Chin Dae-je, CEO of SkyLake Investment, earned a master's and Ph. D at Massachusetts State and Stanford universities, respectively.
He also worked for HP and IBM Watson Research Center in the U.S..
Glenwood Private Equity CEO Lee Sang-ho got an MBA from Columbia Business School and worked at Goldman Sachs.
Kim Jae-wook, the CEO of newborn Orchestra Private Equity, also graduated from the University of Michigan and received an MBA from Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley.
Before he founded Orchestra in 2017, he worked at Bain & Company, the Boston Consulting Group and the Riverside Company, a PEF group spun off from AIG.
Korean execs at foreign PEFs
Koreans who lead PEFs headquarters overseas are also equipped with global experience.
Kim Soo-min, a founding member of Japan-based Unison Capital, worked at Goldman Sachs' Hong Kong and New York offices and served as a partner at Bain & Company.
Ahn Sang-gyun, a managing partner at Hong Kong-based Anchor Equity Partners, worked at McKinsey & Company and Goldman Sachs.
Park Young-taeg, the chairman of Hong Kong-based Affinity Equity Partners, holds an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Affinity managing partner Lee Chul-joo holds a bachelor's from Brown University and an MBA from HBS.
He was a private equity investor at J. H. Whitney & Company and an investment banker at Morgan Stanley.