Blackstone Inc. is an American alternative investment management company based in New York City. It was founded in 1985 as a mergers and acquisitions firm by Peter Peterson and Stephen Schwarzman, who had previously worked together at Lehman Brothers. Blackstone's private equity business has been one of the largest investors in leveraged buyouts in the last three decades, while its real estate business has actively acquired commercial real estate across the globe. Blackstone is also active in credit, infrastructure, hedge funds, secondaries, growth equity, and insurance solutions. As of May 2024, Blackstone has more than US$1 trillion in total assets under management, making it the world's largest alternative investment firm.
Grant Thornton LLP is the American member firm of Grant Thornton International, the seventh largest accounting network in the world by combined fee income. Grant Thornton LLP is the seventh largest U.S. accounting and advisory organization. The firm operates 59 offices across the US with approximately 8,500 employees, 550 partners, and produces annual revenue in excess of US$1.9 billion.
TaylorMade Golf Company is an American sports equipment manufacturing company based in Carlsbad, California, United States. The company focuses on the golf equipment market, producing golf clubs, balls, and clothing. TaylorMade Golf is currently a subsidiary of Centroid Investment Partners after it was purchased from KPS Capital Partners in May 2021.
GlobalLogic is a digital services company providing software development services. It is a subsidiary of Hitachi. GlobalLogic has corporate headquarters in San Jose, California.
In finance, the private-equity secondary market refers to the buying and selling of pre-existing investor commitments to private-equity and other alternative investment funds. Given the absence of established trading markets for these interests, the transfer of interests in private-equity funds as well as hedge funds can be more complex and labor-intensive.
Penn Foster High School is a for-profit online high school based in Scranton, Pennsylvania, United States. The high school is regionally and nationally accredited and is the largest high school by enrollment in the United States.
Houlihan Lokey, Inc., is an American multinational independent investment bank and financial services company. Houlihan Lokey was founded in 1972 and is headquartered at Constellation Place in Century City, Los Angeles, California. The firm advises large public and closely held companies as well as institutions and governments. Its main service lines include mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, restructuring and distressed M&A, fairness opinions, and financial and valuation advisory. As of September 2024, Houlihan Lokey employs more than 2,600 employees worldwide.
The history of private equity, venture capital, and the development of these asset classes has occurred through a series of boom-and-bust cycles since the middle of the 20th century. Within the broader private equity industry, two distinct sub-industries, leveraged buyouts and venture capital experienced growth along parallel, although interrelated tracks.
Private equity in the 2000s represents one of the major growth periods in the history of private equity and venture capital. Within the broader private equity industry, two distinct sub-industries, leveraged buyouts and venture capital expanded along parallel and interrelated tracks.
Lightyear Capital is a private equity firm focused on leveraged buyout and growth capital investments in financial services companies.
Solera Inc is an American company based in Texas which provides risk management and asset protection software and services to the automotive industry and property insurance marketplace. Solera also provides digital identity management services, as well as re-underwriting and data analytics for the automotive, property and casualty insurance industries. Solera is active in 88 countries across six continents.
Vista Equity Partners Management, LLC is an American private equity firm that invests in software, data, and technology-enabled businesses. With over $100 billion in assets under management (AUM), it is one of the largest private equity firms in the world. Vista Equity Partners has invested in hundreds of technology companies, including Citrix, SentinelOne, and Marketo, and has achieved many accolades in the space, most recently being named as 2023's Global Technology Private Equity Firm of the Year by Private Equity International.
AlixPartners is a financial advisory and global consulting firm. Jay Alix founded what became AlixPartners LLP in 1981. The firm has advised on some of the largest Chapter 11 reorganizations including General Motors Co., Kmart, and Enron Corp. The firm has since moved into a more traditional consulting space, and grown to a staff of over 1000. AlixPartners is headquartered in New York, and has offices in more than 20 cities around the world. They were also involved in the Bernie Madoff scandal, identifying 13,000 investors affected by the scandal for the prosecuting team.
Teneo is a public relations and advisory company. The company was founded in June 2011 by Declan Kelly, Paul Keary, and Doug Band, and currently has more than 1,450 employees located in 40 offices. In 2019, Teneo sold a majority stake to CVC Capital Partners, at a total valuation of around $700 million. Today the company is led by Chairwoman Ursula Burns and CEO Paul Keary.
Sanju K. Bansal is an Indian-American businessman, the co-founder of MicroStrategy, a worldwide provider of enterprise software platforms for business intelligence (BI), mobile software, big data and cloud-based services. He served as the company's vice chairman of the board of directors and executive vice president till November 14, 2013. From 1993-2012, he served as chief operating officer of MicroStrategy. Bansal serves or has served as a member of the board of directors of CSRA, a technology services provider to the US government, Cvent, a cloud-based event management software provider, and The Advisory Board Company, a technology research services company.
Pluralsight, LLC is an American privately held online education company that offers a variety of video training courses for software developers, IT administrators, and creative professionals through its website. Founded in 2004 by Aaron Skonnard, Keith Brown, Fritz Onion, and Bill Williams, the company has its headquarters in Draper, Utah. As of July 2018, it uses more than 1,400 subject-matter experts as authors, and offers more than 7,000 courses in its catalog. Since first moving its courses online in 2007, the company has expanded, developing a full enterprise platform, and adding skills assessment modules.
PJT Partners, Inc. is a global advisory-focused investment bank, founded in October 2015 as part of The Blackstone Group's spin-off of its financial and strategic advisory services businesses.
Sage Intacct, Inc is an American provider of cloud-based accounting software and services available a number of regions around the globe – including the United States, Canada, the UK, Australia, and South Africa. Its products offer cloud-based accounting applications that enable business payments, manage and pay bills, and facilitate payroll functions.
Kepler Cheuvreux is an independent European financial services company specializing in research, execution, advisory, and asset management services.
Smartsheet Inc. is an American privately held company that develops and markets the Smartsheet application. As of 2023, it had over 3,000 employees, and is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. The company was founded in the summer of 2005, shortly after co-founder Brent Frei sold his prior company, Onyx Software. Initially it was funded mostly by Frei. About a year after its founding, Smartsheet had raised $4 million in funding and had just nine employees. By early 2012 it had raised $8.2 million in funding over three rounds and hired its first salesperson. The company went public in 2018 via an initial public offering and in 2025 was taken private again by private equity firms Blackstone Inc. and Vista Equity Partners.
