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Seunggu Ahn heads the Korea team within Mubadala Investment Company's Direct Investment Platform as part of its Asia investment strategy since 2023. Before joining Mubadala, she served as Senior Director in the Private Equity team at Korea Investment Corporation (KIC) for over a decade, overseeing investments in diverse private equity strategies globally. Prior to her tenure at KIC, she held positions at Tstone Group, a mid-market buyout firm in Korea, and in Morgan Stanley's Principal Investment division.
Pramod Ahuja is a founding Partner of the Tata Capital Growth Fund franchise with ~US$ 410 Million under management, responsible for Fund activities since 2008. Prior to joining Tata Capital he served as Director, Global Markets at Deutsche Bank, Mumbai. Prior to that he spent 8 years in London working on the Buy side for a long only hedge fund, and a private equity fund of funds. He started his career in 1995 with IL&FS as part of the team managing the AIG Indian Sectoral Equity Fund. Pramod is a member of the British Business Group and the Indo Canadian Business Chamber. He received a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Mumbai University, and an MBA from Clark University, USA.
Mr. Back brings more than 17 years of experience in Buy-Out and Cross-border M&A advisory at Samsung Securities, where he has led numerous transactions including mergers, spin-offs, joint venture formations, and capital raisings across a variety of industries in South Korea. Prior to his tenure at Samsung Securities, he worked as a Certified Public Accountant at Deloitte in Seoul.
Mr. Back holds a B.S. from Hanyang University and an MBA from Seoul National University.
Tim Burroughs is managing editor of Asian Venture Capital Journal, having joined the publication in May 2011. He is responsible for all editorial content put out under the AVCJ brand, including Asian Venture Capital Journal, AVCJtv, AVCJ Awards and AVCJ.com. Tim previously spent five years at China Economic Review, serving as editor-in-chief and then editorial director. Located in Greater China since 2003, during which time he has lived in Beijing, Qingdao and Hong Kong, Tim has been a China-based contributor for publications including The Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph, BBC and China Daily. Prior to moving to China, he trained and worked as a journalist in the UK. He was honored at the Society of Publishers in Asia awards in 2007, 2008 and 2010, and at the State Street Institutional Press Awards - Asia in 2012.
Yunsam Cho is a General Manager in the overseas alternative investment team at Kyobo life insurance. Mr. Cho is leading overseas private debt and private equity investment. In this role, he is working on sourcing, evaluating, and executing investments within overseas private debt and equity. He has dedicated 15+ years career to understanding the overseas alternatives complex and to overseas alternative investment with a variety of global investment partners. Mr. Cho was previously the head of the Kyobo Life London representative office. He set up the Kyobo London office and develop the pan European alternative investment platform of Kyobo with wide spectrum of knowledge, experience, and networks with global alternative investment managers. Mr Cho earned a master’s degree in Finance and a bachelor’s degree in Economics (magna cum laude) from SKKU in Korea.
Sangbum Choo is Head of the Private Equity Investment Team and a member of the PE Investment Committee at Samsung Asset Management. Prior to joining Samsung Asset Management, he was with National Pension Service of Korea(NPS) as a senior portfolio manager for 7 years. Among the 7 years in NPS, he worked for the London office of NPS for 3 years. Before joining NPS, he worked for 5 years at the Global Investment Team of the KTB Asset Management and its Hong Kong based subsidiary, KTB Asia.
Sangbum is a graduate of London Business School and holds a BBA from Seoul National University.
Michael Hwey Hoon Chung is a Managing Director of Morgan Stanley and Head of Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia (MSPEA) South Korea Investment Operations. Mr. Chung also serves on the Firm's Seoul Executive Committee, which is comprised of the Firm's senior business leaders in Korea. Mr. Chung joined the Firm in 2006 and has led MSPEA’s private equity activities in Korea. Mr. Chung currently serves as a Director on the boards of MSS Holdings, Monalisa, SsangYong C&B, MDP Holdings, Skinidea, Life & Bio and Foodcare, and was previously a director of Hyundai Rotem, Hanwha L&C, Jeonju Onepower, Jeonju Paper and SsangYong Corporation. Prior to joining Morgan Stanley, Mr. Chung worked with the LG Group and HSBC. Mr. Chung is a native of South Korea and is based in Seoul. Mr. Chung received a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Brown University.
Pamela is a partner and investment committee member for the Morgan Stanley Private Equity Solutions Team and has 18 years of industry experience. Prior to joining the firm, Pamela was a management consultant with McKinsey & Company's corporate finance practice in Hong Kong, responsible for investment opportunity identification, deal advisory, merger management and strategy development. Previously, she was a management consultant with Monitor Group, specializing in marketing strategy for clients across Asia, and a member of the corporate finance team with Lehman Brothers in Hong Kong. Pamela has a Law degree (first class honors) from the University of Hong Kong and an M.B.A. with honors in finance and management from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
As a Head of alternative investment team for Hyundai Marine&Fire Insurance, Woong is responsible for overseas PE, PD and VC investments as well as domestic ones.
Prior to joining Hyundai Insurance in 2018, he worked for eight years as an Alternative Investment manager with ABL Life (former Allianz Life), where he covered all aspects of alternative assets including Real Estates, Infrastructure and PE.
Before joining Allianz Life Korea in 2011, Woong had two years of fund management experience with Meritz Asset Management.
Prior, he was a semiconductor engineer of the Samsung Electronics for two years. After he left Samsung Electronics, he earned Finance MBA from KAIST Business School.
Prior to re-joining VIG Partners and founding VAC in 2021, Hr. Han spent a decade at Goldman Sachs Asian Special Situations Group (“ASSG”), focusing on special situations and other opportunistic credit investing in Korea. During his tenure at ASSG, Mr. Han deployed more than $1.2bn capital and generated more than $700mm profit without any case of principal loss. Prior to ASSG, Mr. Han began his investing career at VIG Partners as an Associate and prior to that, he worked as an Associate Consultant at Bain & Company.
Jim Hildebrandt is a Partner of Bain Capital in Hong Kong and a founder of the Bain Capital Asia business.
Prior to joining Bain Capital, Mr. Hildebrandt was a partner at Bain & Company, helping to establish Asian offices in China, Korea, Southeast Asia and Australia. Mr. Hildebrandt served on the Global Operating and Compensation Committees, and had regional leadership responsibility for the Private Equity and Financial Services Practices.
Mr. Hildebrandt received an MBA from Stanford Business School and graduated as the Henry Ford II Scholar. He received a JD from the University of Toronto and studied Mathematics at the University of Western Ontario.
Seung-ki Jeong is Kiwoom Asset management’s alternative investment head of team.
He is responsible for investing in alternative assets. Prior to Kiwoom, he worked at DGB Life insurance as an alternative investment manager. Before DGB Life, he was MG Non-Life Insurance company’s alternative investment manager. He started his finance career at DB Financial Investment as an alternative investment analyst.
After completing her undergraduate degree at Georgetown, Cindy worked four years in investment banking at Credit Suisse in New York and Hong Kong.
Pursuing an MBA at Stanford fuelled her interest in start-ups. Transitioning to the investment sector, she joined D3Jubilee, an impact investment firm in Korea.
Since 2014, she's been with SBVA, investing in startups across Korea and Southeast Asia.
Kevin is an Investment Principal at Coller Capital responsible for origination and execution of private equity secondaries investments across Asia, and is based in the firm’s Hong Kong office.
Kevin has over 15 years of experience in strategic advisory, M&A and private equity investments. Prior to joining Coller Capital, Kevin was an Investment Banking Associate in the Mergers and Acquisitions Group at Morgan Stanley in Hong Kong, where he focused on M&A executions across the Asia Pacific region. During his time at Morgan Stanley, he advised sponsors and corporates across China, Korea and Southeast Asia on numerous buyout and M&A transactions. He started his career as an Investment Banking Analyst at UBS in the Strategic Analysis Group based in London office. Kevin has a BA in Business Administration in Sungkyunkwan University in Korea and an MBA from London Business School.
Che Uk Kim joined Atinum Investment in 2010 and is leading investments in mobile services/platforms, software/SaaS. He focuses on startups that innovate the market through IT technology. Before joining the Atinum Investment, he worked on SW development and technology strategy at Samsung Electronics. He won the excellent venture capitalist award from KVIC in 2016 and the best venture capitalist award from KVCA in 2021. Atinum Investment has launched a KRW 860 billion venture fund called Atinum Growth Investment Fund 2023 and Che Uk Kim serves as the lead fund manager. He has M.S. in Computer Engineering, B.S. in Earth and Environmental Sciences from Seoul National University.
Mr. Kim is the Head of Private Equity and Venture Capital at Hanwha Life Insurance, where he manages the PE/VC portfolio and leads investing in funds and co-investment opportunities. Before joining Hanwha in 2016, Mr. Kim worked at the Corporate and Investment Banking franchise of BNP Paribas Seoul Branch. He began his career in the Investment Banking Division at NH Investment & Securities. Mr. Kim holds a BA in Business Administration from Seoul National University.
Eric J. Kim is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Goodwater Capital, a multi-billion dollar venture firm and the world’s largest consumer tech-focused investing platform. Eric has led investments into leading consumer internet companies such as Kakao (IPO – KOSDAQ:035720), Musical.ly (acquired by Bytedance / Tik Tok), Coupang (CPNG), Xendit, Viva Republica (Toss), Danggeun Market (Karrot), MoMo, and EverlyWell.
Prior to co-founding Goodwater, Eric was a Managing Director at Maverick Capital where he helped to build Maverick’s private investments and venture capital business. Eric was also a startup member of two technology companies spun out of Stanford University. Eric began his career as a consultant with McKinsey & Company.
Eric first learned to code as an undergrad at Yale University where he majored in Cognitive Science (Phi Beta Kappa, Magna Cum Laude) and was a member of the Grammy-nominated Yale Cellos. Eric also received an MBA from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. Eric serves on the advisory board of the Johns Hopkins Alliance for Science and Technology and on the boards of the Asian Pacific Fund, College Track, and the St. Thomas More Chapel at Yale University.
John JongSeong Kim is a Vice President of Lexington Partners primarily engaged in the evaluation of secondary purchases of non-U.S. private equity and alternative investments.Prior to joining Lexington in 2023, John was a principal at Cota Capital, a venture capital firm in San Francisco, where he led the firm’s investments in healthcare. Prior to Cota Capital, John held senior investment positions at Glenview Capital in New York and Copernicus Capital in San Francisco, where he invested across various healthcare subsectors. During his tenure at Glenview Capital, John took a hiatus and served in the Republic of Korea Army. He began his career at Morgan Stanley where he was an investment banking analyst in Hong Kong and New York, focusing on cross-border mergers and acquisitions. John graduated cum laude from Columbia University with a B.S. in operations research and earned an M.S. in Management (Sloan Fellow) from Stanford Graduate School of Business
Yu Kyeong Kim has been based in South Korea since 2010, where she heads a team of financial journalists across Seoul and other key parts of Asia for Mergermarket. With extensive experience in investigative reporting on M&A, private equity, and a range of arbitrage and corporate finance transactions, her expertise spans multiple APAC markets beyond South Korea. She is also a holder of the CAIA (Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst) certification.
Carolyn (Kyung Eun) Lee is a Director at KPMG Korea with 12 years of experience in M&A advisory. She specializes in cross-border M&A and has provided M&A advisory service, including acquisitions, divestments, strategic and financial advice. She has worked with a diverse client base, including multinational corporations, PEs, and SMEs across sectors such as manufacturing, consumer goods, life sciences, and technology.
She is a graduate of Brown University with a BA in Economics.
SJ is a managing director in Private and Growth Equity within Goldman Sachs Asset Management, serving as head of Korea Investments. Earlier in his career, he spent eight years in the Investment Banking Division, covering Financial Institutions Group clients across Asia, including Korea and South East Asia. SJ initially joined the firm in 2006 as an associate and rejoined Goldman Sachs in 2023 as managing director.
Prior to rejoining the firm, SJ spent more than eight years at TPG in Asia focusing on buyout and growth investments. SJ has previously worked at Citigroup and PricewaterhouseCoopers. SJ earned a BA in Business Administration from Seoul National University in 2000.
Shaun is Co-President, Partner and member of the management committee of HOPU Investments, an Asia alternative asset manager with US$20billion AUM that specializes in creating proprietary investments driven by its unique network and strong fundamental analysis capabilities. Its industry focuses include consumer, technology, healthcare, financial services, and logistics/real estate. He is also concurrently Head of HOPU-ARM Innovation Fund, a private equity fund set up jointly by HOPU and Arm Technologies investing in deep technology opportunities.
Shaun has over 20 years’ experience in private equity and investment banking, having worked in London, New York, Amsterdam, Singapore and Hong Kong. He was previously Managing Director at Blackstone, Head of China Financial Institutions at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Vice President of ABN AMRO Private Equity. Mr. Lim also founded NBF Capital, a platform specializing in technology investments, as well as co-founded two technology start-ups with HK listed Pico Group in China where he also served as CEO.
Shaun has a Bachelor's degree in Economics (First Class Honours) from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Charles Min joined Affinity Equity Partners in 2007 and is the Head of Affinity Equity Partners in Korea. Before joining Affinity, Charles spent four years in the Global Investment Research group at Goldman Sachs, covering the auto, steel and shipbuilding industries in Korea. Prior to that role, he worked at the corporate advisory department of Deloitte & Touche LLP, covering the North American TMT sector.
Charles received a Bachelor in Economics and International Relations from the University of British Columbia, and a Masters in Management and Professional Accounting from the University of Toronto. He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) charterholder as well as a member of the CPA.
Sunil Mishra specializes in the sourcing and execution of Asian investments ex-China, specifically in India, Australia, Japan, Southeast Asia, and Korea.
Prior to joining Adams Street, Sunil worked for Standard Chartered Bank in Singapore performing financial and business analyses of local and regional companies. Previously, Sunil worked in India as an Investment and Strategy Associate in Tacogroup, the automotive technology and engineering investment arm of the Tata Group of India, where he worked on business planning, feasibility studies, and localization plans for new ventures.
Sunil manages relationships with several of Adams Street’s managers and sits on advisory boards of more than a dozen private equity firms within the Adams Street Partners portfolio.
Sunil is a member of Adams Street’s Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Committee.
Heeeun Park is a Partner at Altos Ventures. She has invested in more than 80 companies with a focus on Korea and throughout Japan and Southeast Asia. When Altos Ventures expanded its presence to Korea with its first Korea fund in 2014, Heeeun joined as the first member of the Korea team. She has played a key role and actively contributed to the growth and success of the firm's investments in Korea. Last year, Altos closed its sixth Korea fund with $600 million. Prior to Altos, Heeeun was the founder and CEO of an online dating app in Korea, where she grew the company from a business plan to the largest mobile dating service in Korea.
Sung Eun Park is a Managing Director of Asia Alternatives and is based in the Firm’s Hong Kong office. Ms. Park is on the Firm’s Investment Committee and co-leads Asia Alternatives’ investments in Korea and Japan. Ms. Park is primarily responsible for deal sourcing, due diligence, deal execution and portfolio management of private equity fund investments and direct co-investments in Japan and Korea. Ms. Park also co-leads the Firm’s Special Situations and Secondaries and is an integral member of Asia Alternatives’ market research team.
Ms. Park has over 17 years of experience in private equity investing, management consulting and business operations in Asia. Prior to joining Asia Alternatives, Ms. Park was a Senior Consultant at Corporate Value Associates (CVA) in the Seoul office, focusing on corporate strategy, operational improvement and due diligence for Korean conglomerates and multinational companies in technology, financial services and consumer industries. Previously, she worked at Sony Group as a product manager of semiconductor and electronic devices, focusing on marketing and sales functions.
Ms. Park holds an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Seoul National University. She is fluent in Korean and conversant in Japanese.
Tanya Sanwal is a Managing Director at Apollo Global Management in the Client and Product Solutions group based in Singapore. In her role, Ms. Sanwal serves as an Institutional Product Specialist focused on Apollo’s credit platform across corporate credit and asset-backed finance. Collectively, she and her team work with institutional investors across APAC to better understand their investment needs and deliver world class alternative solutions across investment grade and non-investment grade private credit.
Prior to joining Apollo, Ms. Sanwal was a Managing Director at Wellington Management in APAC. She was responsible for capital formation within credit and fixed income, new product development and oversight of the APAC Investment Product, Funds & Strategies (IPFS) team. Ms. Sanwal was a member of the Singapore Management Committee, the Global Operating Committee, and the Product Innovation Committee. Previously, she was a Senior Vice President at Pacific Investment Management Company (PIMCO), responsible for multi-sector credit and income solutions in EMEA. Ms. Sanwal began her career at Goldman Sachs in investment banking.
Ms. Sanwal has 18 years of investment experience and holds an MBA from the University of Chicago. She received an undergraduate degree in economics from Cambridge University.
Mr. Schantz joined Bain Capital in 2023. He is a Partner in the Credit group based in Hong Kong.
Previously, Mr. Schantz was a Managing Director with CPP Investment’s APAC Credit team and an Executive Director with Tor Investment Management. Mr. Schantz began his career with Citi’s Special Situations and Credit Portfolio teams in New York.
Sunwha Shin is a partner of UCK Partners. Prior to joining UCK Partners, Ms. Shin worked in Investment Banking Division of Goldman Sachs in Hongkong and Seoul for nine years. She led many landmark transactions in Korea, serving Korean Conglomerates as well as Private Equity firms in Asia. Ms. Shin started her career at McKinsey & Company as analyst and then as associate after promotion at McKinsey & Company. Ms. Shin received an MBA with honors from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from Korea University in Seoul.
Alex Shum is a Managing Director of TPG NewQuest based in Hong Kong. Alex joined TPG NewQuest in 2011 and is responsible for the sourcing, execution and portfolio management of investments for the firm. Alex also leads TPG NewQuest’s China investment teams and has a focus on structuring complex fund solutions transactions. Alex also has a track record of navigating direct investment situations with heavy hands-on involvement, driving the companies throughout its investment lifecycle to successful exits. Alex has more than 15 years of experience in finance, encompassing investments, capital raising, M&A and corporate advisory. Prior to joining TPG NewQuest, he was an Associate at Credit Suisse’s Investment Bank, where he worked in the corporate finance and equity capital markets departments. Alex received his undergraduate degree in Economics from Duke University in Durham, NC. Alex is fluent in English, Mandarin and Cantonese.
With over 23 years of experience in finance, Eugene is Managing Director and Head of Global Alternative Investment Team at Sangsangin Investment & Securities where he leads the firm's placement business of private funds ranging from private equity, private debt, real estate, and infrastructure. Prior to this role, he assumed a position with similar capacity at IBK Securities. He also was a Director at HQ Capital, a leading global private equity investment firm, responsible for primary, secondaries, and co-investments across the Asia-Pacific region, based in Hong Kong. Prior to that, he took various roles at FLAG-Squadron Asia, GE Capital, and Daishin Securities.
Eugene earned his MBA degree from the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University and Bachelor of Economics degree from Korea University. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst.
Wolf is Head of Asia at Deutsche Beteiligungs AG and is responsible for portfolio support, exit facilitation and investor relations in Asia.
He has been based in Asia since 2006 and has more than 20 years of PE/VC experience. His previous work includes roles both with with GPs incl. Capvis, Citic Capital and Advent International as well as LPs incl. Schroders Capital, Capital Dynamics (China) and GIC.
Wolf holds an MBA from China Europe International Business School (Shanghai), a master’s degree from the London School of Economics and a diploma from Humboldt University Berlin. Furthermore, Wolf studied Chinese language and Culture at Zhejiang University Hangzhou.
Mr. Yoon is responsible for private debt investment, primarily focusing on real asset credit at Korea Investment Corporation. Since joining the firm in 2015, he has worked on fund commitment and co-investments of various strategies, including buyouts, venture capital, and secondaries. Prior to KIC, he worked in the group planning division of a major Korean conglomerate in the shipbuilding and shipping industries. Mr. Yoon began his career at KPMG Korea in 2007, where he spent four years as a financial auditor and advisory services professional. He is a Certified Public Accountant and graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Business Administration from Seoul National University. He also holds a Master of Public Administration in International Development from the Harvard Kennedy School.