Private Equity Funds

In finance, private equity is an asset class consisting of equity investments in companies that are not traded on a public stock exchange. Investments typically involve a transformational, value-added, active management strategy.
Private equity firms generally receive a return on their investments through one of three ways: an IPO, a sale or merger of the company they control, or a recapitalization. Unlisted securities may be sold directly to investors by the company (called a private offering) or to a private equity fund, which pools contributions from smaller investors to create a capital pool.
The seeds of the private equity industry were planted in 1946 when the American Research and Development Corporation (ARD) decided to encourage private sector institutions to help provide funding for soldiers that were returning from World War II. While the ARD had difficulty stimulating any private interest in the enterprise and ended up disbanding, they are significant because this marked the first recognized time in financial history that an enterprise of this type had been formed. In addition, they had an operating philosophy that was to become significant in the development of both private equity and venture capital: they believed that by providing management with skills and funding, they could encourage companies to succeed and in doing so, make a profit themselves. During the course of their unsuccessful journey, ARD did succeed in raising approximately $7.4 million, and they did have one rousing success; they funded Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). By the 1970s such private participation had permeated into the private enterprise formation, but till in the late 1970s, the task was being largely carried out by investment arms of a few wealthy families, such as the Rockefellers and Whitneys. In the 1980’s, FedEx and Apple were able to grow because of private equity or venture funding, as were Cisco, Genentech, Microsoft, Avis, Beatrice Foods, Dr. Pepper, Gibson Greetings, and McCall Patterns.Despite these successes, through a series of "debt-financed leveraged buy-outs (LBOs)" of established firms, the PE firms were being seen with acrimony and being casted as irresponsible corporate raiders- as a threat to the free capitalist structure. The extreme example of this phenomenon is described in the bestselling book, where the two PE firms Forstmann Little and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, were described as "Barbarians at the Gate" for their aggressive $25 billion pursuit for RJR Nabisco.