Event Profile

CAIA Vancouver: Search Funds, the Asset Class Nobody Keeps Up With: Educational Event November 27, 2017

Date(s):
November 27, 2017
Note:
All times listed are in local time
Venue:
Four Seasons Hotel
791 W Georgia Street
Vancouver, BC  
Fee(s):
This event has a fee
Description:

Join CAIA Vancouver for an educational presentation:
 
"Search Funds, the Asset Class Nobody Keeps Up With"

Featuring Speakers:

Michael Bennett
, Managing Partner at McIntosh Partners

Jan Simon
, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Vonzeo Capital

Lindsay Masters, Senior Manager at EY 
 
A Search Fund is a pool of capital raised to support the efforts of an entrepreneur, or a pair of entrepreneurs, in locating a privately held company with the purpose of acquiring, operating, growing and selling it. This investment model started in 1984. Since then, over 300 search funds have been launched in North America and 80 internationally.
 
  • Historic IRR of ~35%
  • US Venture Capital performs similarly but with steeper risk profile
  • Low correlation with traditional investments (*see details below) 

Search funds investing is however not well known outside some dedicated investment funds and a series of serial investors.
 
During the session, you will be informed about the specifics of this investment model; why it has delivered persistently high returns as well as what is happening in this space in Canada and the rest of the world.

Agenda:
3:30 PM Registration
4:00 PM Presentation and Discussions
5:30 PM Networking Reception

Fees:

Members and Candidates: 15USD
Guests: 25USD

* more information:
The Center for Entrepreneurial Studies (CES) at Stanford Graduate School of Business, using conservative assumptions, reported an aggregate pre-tax IRR of 36.7% and pre-tax ROIC of 8.4x for North American search funds. The IESE Business School study, reporting the performance of international search funds, calculated aggregate pre-tax IRR of 33.4% and pre-tax ROIC of 2.8x. 

The Center for Entrepreneurship Studies at Stanford has reported on the performance of investments in search funds and the follow-up acquisitions in North America since 2001. Excluding the 52% IRR in the 2007 study, CES has constantly reported IRRs in the high thirties.

With this permanent high performance, investments in search funds and their subsequent acquisitions perform very favorably vis-à-vis other alternative asset classes such as hedge funds and real estate as well as when compared to private equity, be it in US, Europe or Pacific Rim. The only asset class that performs similarly in terms of returns is US venture capital, arguably with a much steeper risk profile.
This event is kindly sponsored by


Find it on Map

Four Seasons Hotel
Documents to share:
Michael Bennett
Organization: McIntosh Partners


Michael is Managing Partner of McIntosh Partners LP, a Vancouver-based search fund looking to acquire, operate and grow a private company headquartered in Canada. Previously Michael worked with McIntosh Properties, a BC-based family investment office, focused on commercial real estate and investments in various operating businesses. Michael also previously worked as a Director of Businesses Development for a leading remote video monitoring company in North America after it was acquired by a search fund, as well as with Synova Capital, a leading private equity investor focused on growth companies in the UK. Michael holds an MBA from London Business School.


Lindsay Masters
Organization: EY Transaction Advisory Services


Lindsay is a Senior Manager in EY’s Vancouver Transaction Support practice, with primary expertise in providing buy-side transaction advisory services. He has been involved in over 70 financial due diligence engagements for a diverse range of clients, including private equity groups, large corporations, owner-managed businesses, and state-owned enterprises. In the past five years, he has led due diligence projects in the mining, oil & gas, retail & distribution, technology, media, and consulting & services sectors. His experience includes buy-side and sell-side roles, dispute situations, financially distressed targets, counterparty diligence, and project management support. His experience includes buy-side and sell-side roles, dispute situations, financially distressed targets, counterparty diligence, and project management support. Lindsay is a Chartered Accountant in Canada (since 2011) and Australia (since 2007). As a graduate of the University of Technology, Sydney, Lindsay received a Bachelor of Accounting / Finance degree in 2004. Prior to joining Transaction Support in 2010, Lindsay had 5 years experience in the Assurance and Advisory Business Services practices in Vancouver and Sydney, Australia, primarily auditing large multi-national and emerging growth companies in the hospitality, real estate, aviation, mining, oil & gas industries.


Jan Simon
Organization: Vonzeo Capital


Jan is an Investor, Banker and Scholar who has invested in private and public markets, advised and raised public capital across multiple industries in Europe and North America. Jan is fluent in English, Spanish, French and Dutch. For over a decade he worked for Goldman Sachs International, Merrill Lynch International, and Salomon Brothers International. He co-headed the Emerging Markets Trading Desk at Salomon Brothers, set up the Continental Sales-Trading Desk at Goldman Sachs and was a member of Merrill Lynch’ Hedge Fund Advisory Group. He has been a special advisor to Pacific Lake Partners, a Boston-based institutional investor in search funds and is the managing partner of Vonzeo Capital, a Vancouver-based institutional investor in search funds. His expertise is in the areas of: investment strategies, alternative investments and mergers and acquisitions for both European and North American markets. He has managed money in equities, fixed income and advised hedge funds in a variety of strategies. He has a PhD in Finance, Master in Business Administration, Post-Graduate in Investment Advice, Masters in Law, and a Bachelor of Law. Since 2003 Jan has been teaching at universities in Europe and North America. He has taught at Beedie School of Business, IESE Business School, INSEAD, NYU Stern and UCLA Anderson School of Management. He was a Visiting Scholar at the London School of Economics. He is on the Dean’s Roll for Excellence in Teaching and has won several ‘Best Teacher’s Awards’. The Economist rated him as one of the Top #20 Business School Professors in the world. He served the first battalion Para-Commando as well as NATO’s Special Intervention Forces. He holds both Commando A and Parachutist A military certificates.