
To pastures new: Asia PE people moves
A selection of the transfers, promotions, arrivals and departures in the private equity community in 2019
LIMITED PARTNERS
CDC GROUP Tony Morgan, who was previously a managing director at Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, is appointed as a managing director responsible for direct equity. Stephen Priestley also comes in as a managing director, but with a focus on South Asia and Africa. A permanent office opens in Bangladesh with Rehan Rashid named country director
COMMONFUND CAPITAL Xiaonan Tian is named an associate director and head of the investment office in Beijing from where she will oversee Asia Pacific portfolio. She previously worked for HSBC
ENERGY SUPER Kevin Wan Lum is appointed CIO, having previously spent more than three years at VicSuper as acting CIO and as a senior portfolio manager with responsibility for real assets and alternatives
FUTURE FUND Alicia Gregory is recruited as head of private equity. She previously spent 14 years working within MLC’s private equity program, including a three-year stint in London Alicia Gregory as head of European PE. Cameron Sinclair departs for Funds SA to serve as private equity and infrastructure head, while Sid Khotkar joins from TPG Capital as a director
GOVERNMENT PENSION INVESTMENT FUND Hiro Mizuno is reappointed as CIO of the Japanese pension fund following the conclusion of his first term. Mizuno was previously a partner at Coller Capital.
HAMILTON LANE Mingchen Xia and Collwyn Tan are named co-heads of investment in Asia. They already cover fund investments and co-investments, respectively, in the region
HARBOURVEST PARTNERS Minjin Chung is promoted to partner with responsibility for North Asia, while Hong Kong-based secondaries specialists Dominic Goh and Martin Yung become principals. Warwick Mancini is also hired from Challenger Investment Partners as a principal to cover investor relations in Australia and New Zealand
HQ CAPITAL Motoya Kitamura, who has previously held positions secondaries investor AB Value Capital Partners and fund-of-funds ROC Partners, joins HQ Capital as a managing director focused on Japan
MANULIFE Myron Zhu, formerly co-head of PE at Aberdeen Standard Investments, is appointed head of Asia private markets based in Hong Kong
NEW ZEALAND SUPERANNUATION FUND Stephen Gilmore is named CIO, having previously served as chief investment strategist. The appointment follows the promotion of previous CIO Matt Whineray to CEO
PARTNERS GROUP Ravi Jeyaraj, formerly of Navis Capital Partners, comes in as head of private equity direct investments in Australia
STEPSTONE GLOBAL Beijing-based Vincent Hsu is promoted to partner. He is part of the team that covers primary fund commitments, secondaries, and co-investments across Asia
GENERAL PARTNERS
ADITYA BIRLA PRIVATE EQUITY D. Muthukumaran departs following a nearly five-year stint as CEO to become CFO of clean energy company ReNew Power
ADVENT PARTNERS Rob Hooke, who joined in 2013 as an investment manager, is promoted to partner
AFFIRMA CAPITAL The firm is established through a spin-out of Standard Chartered’s private equity team, with support from ICG
APOLLO GLOBAL MANAGEMENT Tetsuji Okamoto is appointed partner and head of Japan to lead private equity efforts in the country. He previously spent 11 years with Bain Capital
AVAANA CAPITAL The India-based investment firm is founded by Sanjib Jha, formerly lead advisor for micro, small and medium-sized enterprise finance at the World Bank
BAIN CAPITAL Suruchi Nangia is recruited from Aion Capital to serve as head of a new team focusing on India credit and special situations
THE CARLYLE GROUP Ling Yang, a managing director based in Shanghai, is promoted to partner. John Kim joins from Goldman Sachs as a managing director in its Asia buyout team and head of all investment activity in Korea. Le Guan and Dennis Wang are elevated to managing director and Tian Ai becomes a director. All three focus on China. Mumbai-based Kapil Modi and Rahul Mukim are named directors
CENTURIUM CAPITAL Michael Chen, formerly an investor with Warburg Pincus, is recruited as a partner and managing director
CHINA RENAISSANCE Ou Wang, previously head of private equity for China Investment Corporation, is signed up as a strategic consultant
CDIB CAPITAL Alex Ying, who spent nearly 20 years with The Carlyle Group before launching China-focused PE firm Rivendell Partners, joins as head of the newly created buyout group. Robert Liu is recruited as a managing director and co-head of its regional healthcare practice group in Shanghai. He previously led venture investments at Johnson & Johnson
CORAL CAPITAL Ken Nishimura, Google Japan’s head of start-ups and strategic relations, joins as a partner and chief editor. The appointment follows a rebranding of the firm from 500 Startups Japan
DCM Beijing-based Ray Zhao, who joined in 2014 from the investment arm of Tencent Holdings, is promoted to partner
EAST VENTURES Melisa Irene, who joined in 2015 as an associate based in Indonesia, becomes the first female partner
EIGHT ROADS Dave Ng joins from B Capital Group as head of Southeast Asia based in Singapore
ELEVATION EQUITY PARTNERS The firm is established by the Korea team of The Rohatyn Group under the leadership of Gordon Cho
EQT Singapore-based Brian Chang is promoted to partner with responsibility for mid-market activity in Asia
EVERSTONE GROUP Alok Oberoi, a former Goldman Sachs executive and a shareholder in Everstone since inception, is named executive chairman. Vibhor Kumar Talreja joins from Temasek Holdings as a managing director with responsibility for financial services investments, while Suresh Vaswani, previously an executive at Wipro, Dell, and IBM, comes in as a senior director focused on IT deals
FULLERTON FUND MANAGEMENT Huck Khim Tan is hired to lead a newly established dedicated private equity team. He was previously with Credit Suisse, managing private equity assets for institutional clients as part of the firm’s customized fund investment group
GENERAL ATLANTIC Ashish Saboo, a former executive at PwC and local conglomerate CT Corp, is appointed as a managing director and chief representative in Indonesia
GENESIS ALTERNATIVE VENTURES Ben Benjamin, an angel investor in Southeast Asia, is recruited to lead a venture debt provider established by the family office of the Sassoon family and Indonesia’s CIMB Niaga. He is joined by Jeremy Loh and Martin Tang, who previously worked together at DBS Bank’s venture debt platform
GOLDEN EQUATOR CAPITAL Pooja Gurbani is appointed as a partner in its venture investments team, taking responsibility for monitoring portfolio companies and maintaining strategic partnerships across the innovation and investment communities
ICG Wooseok Jun, a managing director and head of South Korea, is promoted to head of Asia Pacific, replacing Chris Heine who retired at the end of 2018
IFM INVESTORS Adrian Kerley, an investment manager responsible for private markets at Australia’s Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, joins the private equity team as an executive director
INCE CAPITAL PARTNERS The firm is established by J.P. Gan, who previously spent 13 years leading consumer internet investments at Qiming Venture Partners. He is joined by fellow Qiming investment professionals Steven Hu and Alex Yan, while Paul Yeung – most recently a venture partner at Qiming – comes in as CFO
KKR Hiro Hirano and Ashish Shastry, who lead KKR’s operations in Japan and Southeast Asia, respectively, are appointed co-heads of private equity across the region. Chung Ho Park, co-head of India, is elevated to partner level, while Hisao Ijima, Prashant Kumar, Terence Lee, and Gareth Woodbridge – members of the private equity team in Tokyo, Mumbai, Singapore, and Sydney, respectively – become managing directors. Weiyu Tan, who is part of the capital markets team, and Abhishek Kapur, a Capstone executive in Southeast Asia, are also promoted to managing director. David Luboff comes in as head of Asia infrastructure from Macquarie Infrastructure & Real Assets, with team member Hardik Shah promoted to managing director. Sharon Yang transfers to the impact investment division as a senior investor, while former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull becomes a global senior advisor. Kate Richdale, previously chairman of investment banking for Asia ex-Japan at Goldman Sachs, is hired for a new position as head of strategy and business development for Asia Pacific
LEGEND CAPITAL Piau-Voon Wang, formerly of Adams Street Partners, Noah Holdings, and China Development Bank-owned CDB Capital, comes in as a managing director and COO
LIGHTHOUSE FUNDS P.K. Hariharan, a fast-moving consumer goods industry veteran, joins as an operating partner
THE LONGREACH GROUP Takuya Sato, who joined in 2013 from Barclays, is promoted to partner
MONK’S HILL VENTURES Michele Daoud and Justin Nguyen are promoted to partner, based in Singapore and Vietnam, respectively. Daoud arrived from Google in 2016 as a principal, while Nguyen was hired as an operating advisor the same year
NORWEST VENTURE PARTNERS Shiv Chaudhary rejoins from Edelweiss Financial Services as a managing director based in Mumbai
ONEVENTURES Nick Gainsley, a venture debt specialist at UK-based Kreos Capital, is recruited to lead the 1V Venture Credit Fund as a principal. Grant Chamberlain, who joined from Bank of America Merrill Lynch as a principal in 2017, is promoted to partner
ORIOS VENTURE PARTNERS Rajeev Suri is named managing partner, having originally been recruited as a venture partner. He previously ran the new business incubator at Vuclip
PAG Nikhil Srivastava is hired to lead India private equity coverage. He previously spent nearly a decade with KKR, first in San Francisco and then in Mumbai
QIMING VENTURE PARTNERS Stella Zhou becomes the first person to be elevated from associate to partner within the firm, having joined in 2010. Oscar Zhang and Jinda Gao are both promoted from vice presidents to principals within the healthcare team
SABRE PARTNERS Davesh Manocha rejoins as a partner, having left in 2016 to launch Juno Clinic, an online clinic for mental well-being issues. Jagannath Samavedam is recruited from Ventureast as a partner
SOFTBANK VENTURES ASIA Seung Le, previously an M&A advisor at Morgan Stanley, is hired as CFO
TA ASSOCIATES Dhiraj Poddar, a director and head of India operations, is promoted to managing director. He joined in 2010 from Standard Chartered Private Equity
TIKEHAU CAPITAL The France-based asset manager expands its Asia footprint with an office in Tokyo, led by Sergei Diakov, a former client manager for Citi Global Markets in Japan
TPG CAPITAL David Tan, formerly a director with KKR’s private equity team, is hired as a managing director based in Singapore with responsibility for Southeast Asia
UNISON CAPITAL Junko Katayanagi and Tsutomu Kunisawa are both promoted to partner. Katayanagi joined in 2006 from Morgan Stanley, while Kunisawa arrived in 2017 from Mitsubishi Corporation.
VÄRDE PARTNERS Singapore-based CIO Ilfryn Carstairs is named CEO alongside George Hicks, the incumbent and co-founder of the firm. Haseeb Malik, a senior managing director based in Singapore and head of Asia corporate and traded credit, is promoted to partner
VULCAN CAPITAL The US-based venture investor set up by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen opens a Singapore office and recruits Tommy Teo from Northstar Group as head of Southeast Asia. He is joined by Minjie Yu, previously a partner at Ethos Partners
WARBURG PINCUS Yilong Du, is hired from Latham & Watkins as a managing director and co-general counsel for China and Southeast Asia
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