The decisions of private equity firms affect the development of industries and national economies, yet little is known about how these decisions are made. Mark Broere uses proprietary survey data from 136 private equity firms (venture capital and buyout) located in the US, Canada, and Europe to explore determinants and rules of their decision-making. The results exhibit new facts about their objectives, success measures, decision criteria, exit decision power and rules. A discussion in light of existing financial theory highlights, e.g. the role of reputation, and potential pitfalls in the decision-making of practitioners. The author suggests that private equity firms might improve their performance by a more careful choice of decision rules and criteria and by a more consistent application of these across varying decision types.

This paper examines decision-making models used by private equity investors in their selection of family firms. Building on literature on investment criteria at start-up stage, a series of hypotheses is put forward, based on decision-making, strategic management and buyout theories. The theoretical model is tested through an experimental design for which data have been collected among 41 respondents based in Italy. Findings are analysed using hierarchical linear models, in order to investigate which criteria are used, assess their relative importance and test whether decision-making models are individual-specific or influenced by the firm individuals work for.

Private equity-backed companies are ubiquitous and economically significant. Consequently, the corporate governance of these companies matters to all of us, and – not surprisingly – is coming under increasing scrutiny. Simon Witney, a practicing private equity lawyer, positions private equity portfolio companies within existing academic theory and examines the laws that apply to them in the UK. He analyses the actual governance frameworks that are put in place and identifies problems created by the legal rules – as well as the market's solutions to them. This book not only explains why these governance mechanisms are established, but also what they are expected to achieve. Witney suggests that private equity owners have both the incentives and the capability to focus on responsible investment practices. Good governance, he argues, is a critical success factor for the private equity industry.

Individuals utilize heuristics to simplify problems leading to potential decision-making biases. "How do heuristics impact the investment process of private equity decision-makers reviewing proposals?" Through an exploratory multi-case analysis, insight is provided into complex private equity decisions by studying biases in the investment process. The beginning expectation was that the affect heuristic would be dominant. Results suggest different heuristics are used through decision-making processes. Five propositions are proffered, arguing the use of different heuristics in the investment decision-making process. Decision-makers draw on learning from experience and apply deliberative heuristics to guide selection decisions regarding the opportunity. Procedural heuristics guide post transaction management decisions. Affect heuristics are utilized when reviewing business opportunities. Organizational learning is exhibited through the modification of investment structures based on previous experiences. Human capital positively impacts the investment decisions. The study indicates that experience and learning leads to the construction of different heuristics that subsequently impact investments.

Private equity firms have long been at the center of public debates on the impact of the financial sector on Main Street companies. Are these firms financial innovators that save failing businesses or financial predators that bankrupt otherwise healthy companies and destroy jobs? The first comprehensive examination of this topic, Private Equity at Work provides a detailed yet accessible guide to this controversial business model. Economist Eileen Appelbaum and Professor Rosemary Batt carefully evaluate the evidence—including original case studies and interviews, legal documents, bankruptcy proceedings, media coverage, and existing academic scholarship—to demonstrate the effects of private equity on American businesses and workers. They document that while private equity firms have had positive effects on the operations and growth of small and mid-sized companies and in turning around failing companies, the interventions of private equity more often than not lead to significant negative consequences for many businesses and workers. Prior research on private equity has focused almost exclusively on the financial performance of private equity funds and the returns to their investors. Private Equity at Work provides a new roadmap to the largely hidden internal operations of these firms, showing how their business strategies disproportionately benefit the partners in private equity firms at the expense of other stakeholders and taxpayers. In the 1980s, leveraged buyouts by private equity firms saw high returns and were widely considered the solution to corporate wastefulness and mismanagement. And since 2000, nearly 11,500 companies—representing almost 8 million employees—have been purchased by private equity firms. As their role in the economy has increased, they have come under fire from labor unions and community advocates who argue that the proliferation of leveraged buyouts destroys jobs, causes wages to stagnate, saddles otherwise healthy companies with debt, and leads to subsidies from taxpayers. Appelbaum and Batt show that private equity firms’ financial strategies are designed to extract maximum value from the companies they buy and sell, often to the detriment of those companies and their employees and suppliers. Their risky decisions include buying companies and extracting dividends by loading them with high levels of debt and selling assets. These actions often lead to financial distress and a disproportionate focus on cost-cutting, outsourcing, and wage and benefit losses for workers, especially if they are unionized. Because the law views private equity firms as investors rather than employers, private equity owners are not held accountable for their actions in ways that public corporations are. And their actions are not transparent because private equity owned companies are not regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Thus, any debts or costs of bankruptcy incurred fall on businesses owned by private equity and their workers, not the private equity firms that govern them. For employees this often means loss of jobs, health and pension benefits, and retirement income. Appelbaum and Batt conclude with a set of policy recommendations intended to curb the negative effects of private equity while preserving its constructive role in the economy. These include policies to improve transparency and accountability, as well as changes that would reduce the excessive use of financial engineering strategies by firms. A groundbreaking analysis of a hotly contested business model, Private Equity at Work provides an unprecedented analysis of the little-understood inner workings of private equity and of the effects of leveraged buyouts on American companies and workers. This important new work will be a valuable resource for scholars, policymakers, and the informed public alike.

Ulrich Lossen explores the trade-off between diversification and specialization in private equity funds. In a first step, he analyzes the influence of external factors on the choice of private equity firms to diversify their portfolios across different dimensions, such as financing stages, industries, and geographic regions. Then, he examines the impact of diversification on private equity funds’ performance.