Bill Chisholm | |
---|---|
Born | William F. Chisholm Jr. |
Alma mater | Dartmouth College (BA) University of Pennsylvania (MBA) |
Occupation(s) | Private equity fund partner, entrepreneur |
Title | Co-founder, managing partner, and chief investment officer of STG Partners, LLC |
Political party | Democratic [1] |
Spouse | Kimberly Ford Chisholm |
Children | 3 |
William F. Chisholm Jr. is an American businessman. He is the managing partner and chief investment officer for STG Partners, LLC, a private equity firm. [2] [3]
In 2025, Chrisholm purchased the Boston Celtics of the National Basketball Association (NBA) for $6.1 billion. [4] [5] [6]
Chisholm grew up in Georgetown, Massachusetts. [7] His father, William F. Chisholm Sr. (1929–2017), played a role in establishing the Georgetown High School soccer program, [8] and his mother, Judy Chisholm, worked as an administrative assistant at Brooks School. [9] Chisholm and his siblings attended Brooks School, where he played basketball, lacrosse, and soccer, and led the soccer team to its first ever Class A New England Prep championship. [9] In his senior year, he won The Boston Globe's All-Scholastic award for soccer. [10] He graduated from Brooks in 1987. [9]
He went to Dartmouth College, where he played for the soccer team [11] [12] and was a member of Alpha Chi Alpha. [2] He graduated from Dartmouth in 1991. [13] He later received a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1996. [14] He grew up a fan of the Boston Celtics [2] and is reported to have an "encyclopedic knowledge" of the team. [15]
After graduating from Dartmouth, Chisholm worked as an analyst for PaineWebber in New York. [16] From January 1994 to August 1994, he served as chief financial officer of International Sports Publishing. [14] From August 1996 to January 2000, he served as a management consultant at Bain & Company. [17] [18] [19] In 1999, Chisholm was elected to the board of directors of FAFCO INC., a solar pool heating company that was headed by his father-in-law, Freeman A. Ford. [14] [19] [20] The company ceased operations in 2024. [21]
According to an SEC filing, Chisholm was a partner of the Valent Group, an early-stage venture firm, from January 2000 to January 2002. [19] In February 2000, Romesh Wadhwani invited Chisholm to join Symphony Technology Group (Symphony), a venture capital firm, as a partner. [17] [2] [22] In August 2001, Chisholm acquired a "less than 5%" ownership in Symphony. [23] In July 2002, Chisholm through his living trust acquired "5% but less than 10%" ownership in Symphony. [23] In 2017, Wadhwani retired as Symphony's CEO, and the firm was reconfigured as STG Partners, LLC. [24] [25] [26]
STG Partners and Symphony are two different firms, [24] yet maintain an inter-company agreement. [27] In December 2017, Chisholm was named managing partner and chief investment officer (CIO) of STG Partners. [26] [28] As a managing partner, Chisholm, individually, acquired a "less than 5%" ownership in STG Partners. [29] In 2021, he acquired a beneficial ownership, "50% but less than 75%", in STG Management Feeder, L.P., [30] which owns "greater than 75%" of STG Management Holdings, [29] which is the controlling entity of STG Partners. [29] [30] On March 28, 2025, STG Partners reported that it represented 19 clients in pooled investment vehicles totaling approximately $12 billion in assets under management, [29] a slight increase from 2024. [3] In addition, the SEC document noted that STG Partners maintains "less than one billion dollars" in total assets. [29] [30] As well, Chisholm and his living trust own less than 15% of Symphony, which has assets under management of approximately $341 million. [23]
In March 2025, Chisholm led an investment group, including current Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck, Bruce A. Beal, Jr., Rob Hale, Sixth Street Partners, and others, [4] to enter into a definitive agreement to purchase the Boston Celtics for an initial valuation of $6.1 billion from Boston Basketball Partners. [4] [31] [32] In 2024, the Celtics' annual revenue was $493 million. [33] The proposed Celtics purchase price is the largest amount ever for a North American sports franchise. [34]
The NBA league office must first review the agreement. [33] [35] [36] After its review, Chisholm's proposal will be submitted to the NBA's Board of Governors for approval. [4] [35] The agreement calls for Chisholm and his investors to acquire at least 51% of the team. [5] The remaining 49%, currently held by Grousbeck and his investors, [37] some of whom are also part of Chisholm's group, would maintain the option to hold the remaining shares until 2028, where they may be sold for a higher valuation. [5] [37] [38] Goldman Sachs, [39] Jordan Park Group, [4] JP Morgan, [33] Mary Callahan Erdoes, [39] and BDT & MSD Partners, [5] whose co-CEO is Gregg Lemkau, Chisholm's Dartmouth classmate and soccer teammate, [5] [39] [40] assisted in financing the Celtics deal. [39]
In May 2025, Indian business heir and the CEO of ArcelorMittal, Aditya Mittal invested $1 billion into Chisholm’s purchase of the Celtics, giving the former a significant stake in the team [41]
NBA investment rules dictate that a lead owner or "control person" must raise cash, not debt, [39] and must possess at least a 15% financial interest in the team. [2] [39] [42] In addition, according to the league's private equity ownership rules, Chisholm's ownership percentage must be greater than a private equity fund, such as Sixth Street Partners. [35] [43] As the control person, Chisholm must purchase more than a $1 billion stake in the Celtics; approximately $500 million is due when the deal closes, and the remainder balance within three years of the purchase date. [2] [39]
It is not clear how much money Chisholm has or has to invest in the proposed $6.1 billion Celtics purchase. [5] [39] [35] [44] Although a Forbes article calculates his current net worth as greater than $1 billion, [2] he is not included on either the Bloomberg Billionaires Index or Forbes Billionaires list. [45]
A California resident, [1] [46] Chisholm is married to Kimberly Ford Chisholm, [47] [48] whom he met as an undergraduate at Dartmouth. [2] [9] His wife is the great-granddaughter of Gutzon Borglum. [49] Three generations of his and her families have attended Dartmouth. [46] His father-in-law, Freeman Ford, is a Dartmouth alumnus. [46] [50] The couple have three children, [9] [51] who are all Dartmouth alumni. [46] [52] The Chisholms own a home on the border of the Dartmouth campus in Hanover, New Hampshire. [46]
In 2013, Chisholm required heart surgery. [48]
The Chisholms have been active supporters of Breakthrough T1D (formerly Juvenile Diabetes Foundation). [51] In 2016, they were honored with the Breakthrough T1D Impact Award for their contributions to curing, preventing, and treating Type 1 diabetes. [51] In 2020, they were recognized as lifetime members of the JDRF One Society, which recognizes donor who have pledged and/or donated more than one million dollars to Breakthrough T1D. [53] [54]
In 2020, Chisholm donated to California Democratic Congressman Josh Harder. [1] [42]