M&A Origination Analyst

M&A Origination Analyst | London | Private Equity Deal Sourcing

A rare chance to stop selling into private equity and start working alongside it.

If you're at an expert network or in Private Equity search, you already do the hardest part of this job. You map a market from nothing and you get senior people on the phone who had no intention of taking your call. You keep going after the fourth no.

What you don't get is a seat on the deal.

My client is a US buy-side acquisition search firm. They find acquisition targets for private equity funds and the companies those funds own. Well over a hundred people do this in the States, and they've advised the buyer on more than a thousand deals. London is now being built from scratch under a newly appointed Director, and this is one of the first hires into that team.

Why it's worth a conversation

Your day would be spent with MDs at private equity funds and the CEOs of their portfolio companies, then on the phone to the founders and owners of the businesses those clients want to buy. You'd be on the client side of the table for once.

They're not a pure adviser either. Alongside the client work they invest their own money into deals, and that side of the business is expected to reach Europe as the London team grows.

There's no financial modelling. They hire on commercial instinct and a willingness to pick up the phone, then teach the rest. Most of their senior people came up exactly that way.

Pay is a base plus bonus on the transactions your team closes. No discretionary pot, no arbitrary gates.

Being the first hire means you'd be building your own team a lot sooner than you would somewhere with an established structure above you.

Who it suits

One to three years in an expert network, private equity search, data or information sales, or anywhere else where cold calling is a key part of your role. London-based and happy to be in the City office five days a week.

Already done M&A origination? There's some flex on level.