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Blackstone's Tony James has made a name for himself pursuing billion dollar buyouts. His brothers Benjamin and David James are establishing the James surname in the small and middle market
The Blackstone Groups Hamilton "Tony" James has built his name and bank account chasing multibillion-dollar buyouts. When it comes to family investments, however, brothers Benjamin and David James target decidedly smaller plays. Swift River Investments, the family fund run by the James family, focuses squarely on lower middle-market opportunities, marrying investment acumen with operational know-how. Benjamin James spoke with Mergers O1Acquisitions, discussing the themes behind Swift River and the trends he's seeing in the smaller deal realm.
Mergers & Acquisitions: Can you tell us about the Swift River partnership and what your investment philosophy is?
Benjamin James: We take some complementary skill sets and apply them to smaller middle-market companies, where we think we can add a lot of value. We take a boutique approach where we incorporate our high-level experience.
I have been in the private equity business for a number of years. My brother David has very senior operating experience, and we also have a very experienced vice president, Christina Pai, who is extremely smart and capable.
Many firms our size don't have the kind of senior operating experience that we do, and certainly not available as a full-time resource. In addition, all of our capital is family capital, so we don't have any limited partners.
We believe that the economy is going to get worse, and market conditions are going to get tougher, but we think that we can be very successful because of our experience and attention to detail. We are essentially entrepreneurs. Swift River is a family owned operation that happens to be in the private equity business....