Why is PE so successful?
We passionately believe that PE provides a highly successful model for accelerating the growth of such companies – and, in many ways, a more successful one than the public equity model.
There are two interlinked reasons for this.
For a start, PE aligns the interests of managers and shareholders much more closely than in a listed company. That’s possible because there are usually fewer shareholders involved – normally over 90% of shareholders are at the board table.
Secondly, PE has, by its nature, to take a much longer term view. The 10-year life cycle of our own funds would represent a lifetime in public equity terms. PE investors have to be patient. They must wait a long time to receive a return on their investment.
Public company shareholders and investors in Hedge Funds expect to receive returns at least annually or, in some case, even quarterly – a regime that tempts businesses to target short-term rather than sustainable results.
Against that backdrop, PE provides a much more fertile environment for entrepreneurial flair, genuine operational transformation and faster growth.