View this email online 

For Bridge Growth’s Alok Singh, 'tech is everything'; Blackstone’s Career Pathways enhances value creation

Good morning, PE Hubsters! Rafael Canton here with the US edition of the Wire from the New York newsroom.

First, we have a chat with Bridge Growth Partners’ Alok Singh about the firm announcing the sale of Syniti to Capgemini and trends in technology dealmaking.

Next is the Disruption Matters podcast, which has its third episode which is focused on how tech and AI can be used to discover and solve problems.

Finally, PE Hub attended Blackstone’s Career Pathways Summit earlier this week and we have some insights into the power of the firm’s network.

Tech trends

In August, Bridge Growth Partners announced that it sold enterprise software provider Syniti to Capgemini. When the deal closes later this year, it will be the firm’s fourth exit in the past three years. PE Hub caught up with Alok Singh, co-founder, CEO and chief investment officer at Bridge Growth to learn more about the Syniti investment and how it grew the company, as well as trends to watch for in the technology sector. Here’s a sample of our conversation.

Premium subscribers can read about PE Hub’s conversation with Alok Singh, including why, for him, "technology is everything."

The human element

The Disruption Matters miniseries podcast is back for a third episode. The series has looked at how private markets can use today’s technologies to create value throughout its third season.

Find out more about the episode with the premium version of the Wire.

Value creation

This week, PE Hub attended Blackstone’s Career Pathways Summit. Through Career Pathways, Blackstone helps its portfolio companies identify new sources of talent, primarily by partnering with nonprofit organizations that upskill, reskill and train people from untapped talent communities.

PE Hub has been following along with the Career Pathways program. Earlier this year, PE Hub editor-in-chief Mary Kathleen (MK) Flynn spoke with Marcus Felder, who leads Career Pathways, at PEI’s NEXUS summit about the impact of the program.

Read the premium version of the Wire for insights from Blackstone portfolio companies using Career Pathways and comments from Blackstone president and COO Jonathan Gray.

Later today, MK will be talking with Thomas Holzheu, chief economist Americas, Swiss Re Institute, at PEI’s Private Debt Investor New York Forum 2024.  The Federal Reserve is expected finally to begin raising interest rates, and Holzheu will share insights on that topic and other economic issues affecting dealmakers.

That’s it from me today. If you have any questions, thoughts, or want to chat, please email me at rafael.c@pei.group.

Tomorrow, Craig McGlashan will be with you for the Europe edition of the Wire, and Michael Schoeck will bring you the US edition.

Cheers,

Rafael

Read the full Wire commentary on PE Hub ...

Also of note (may require subscriptions)

PE love letter: How a private equity couple makes it work. Maintaining a relationship between two private equity professionals can be a challenge, as work and travel take up most of their time. "It forces us to be intentional about how we spend time together," said Matt Swain, who leads direct placements and secondaries at Houlihan Lokey and got engaged to Jackie Heath, a vice-president from IVEST Consumer Partners, earlier this month. (Buyouts)

New Private Markets is out with a special report on how regulators are shaping private markets and influencing investors’ approaches to sustainability. A sampling of what's on offer:

• What the California climate disclosure laws mean for private equity

• SFDR: A groundbreaking regulation in need of reform

Chicago-based asset manager Waterton closed its latest multifamily value-add fund, Waterton Residential Property Venture XV, with $1.7 billion in commitments – shy of its $2 billion target but still 15 percent larger than the series’ previous fund and the second-largest multifamily fund to close this year. (Private Equity Real Estate)

Four limited partners at the Private Debt Investor New York Forum seemed satisfied with what their portfolios were delivering, but wanted more deployment and had some concern over deal terms.

A Chicago-based family office has led a single-asset continuation process on a long-term single-asset investment fund. Council Ring Capital, a single-family office founded by the Mills family, led the deal to move Finnish biological raw material product supplier Medix Biochemica out of DevCo Partners’ second fund and into a separate vehicle, according to a statement. The transaction was worth €616 million. (Secondaries Investor)

They said it

“Working with a strategic is a very different thing than working with private equity firms where maybe there’s two or three people at the top who actually make the decision. In the context of a strategic, you actually have to have buy-in at every level.”

— Alok Singh, co-founder, CEO and chief investment officer Bridge Growth Partners on the firm’s investment and exit from Syniti