Charlotte’s Falfurrias Management Partners private-equity group named a new chief financial officer and elevated three members to principal positions.
Rob Heidel is the new CFO, after joining in 2022. He’s been an interim CFO and chief compliance officer. His predecessor, JJ Schonberg, had the job since Falfurrias formed 20 years ago, but is now involved in a new entrepreneurial effort, says Ed McMahan, managing partner.
Among the three new principals are Hugh McColl IV, the grandson of Falfurrias co-founder Hugh McColl Jr., who Daily Digest readers may have heard of. The younger McColl has worked for Falfurrias after previously working as executive director of strategy at the Raleigh-based Parexel clinical research firm and as an associate at Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe, a large private equity firm based in New York.
Other new principals include Katie Rose-Austin, who joined in 2016, and Grant Hundley, who joined in 2020. Hundley is a former special operations and infantry officer in the U.S. Marine Corps.
Falfurrias also promoted Jubal Early to vice president. He was hired in 2021 after working for Truist Securities. His father, who has the same name, is a veteran Charlotte real-estate developer.
“Rob has been a trusted leader across our finance and compliance functions, and our new principals and vice president have consistently demonstrated strong judgment, ownership, and alignment with our investment philosophy,” McMahan said in a release.
McColl, McMahan and former Bank of America CFO Marc Oken formed Falfurrias in 2006. It has become one of the Southeast’s largest buyout groups after raising $3.6 billion in seven funds, which have gradually become larger as it exits successful investments.
The company is now investing the proceeds of $1.35 billion fund that closed last year, and a separate $1 billion fund raised three years ago, McMahan says.
Falfurrias continues to focus on its long-time sectors including food, industrial manufacturing and financial technology, he adds. But it’s also made five investments in government-services firms over the past three years, influenced by Hundley’s experience in the military.
Falfurrias’ fourth fund, which raised $500 million by 2019, had a 41.7% annual internal rate of return, according to Buyoutsinsider.com, citing an unnamed public pension system’s report. Its fifth fund, which raised $850 million by 2021, returned 11.8%, the website reported.
PE groups use the principal title as a step before employees become full partners. Falfurrias’ website lists 10 partners and three managing directors, in addition to the three founders.
David Mildenberg is editor of Business North Carolina. Reach him at dmildenberg@businessnc.com.