Sachem Partners

Fernando is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Sachem Partners. Before that, Fernando worked as an engineer in Spain, Sweden and Israel, where he joined the venture-backed startup Traffix Systems, which delivered Networking Software for mobile operators in EMEA, APAC and North America. After being acquired by F5 Networks, he accepted a project management role at F5 Networks, delivering projects for the Traffix product, improving operations and increasing revenues . His projects were particularly successful in Japan, Portugal, Greece, Singapore and Philippines. He last worked at Amazon Lab126 in California as the Senior Product Manager in the tablets team, where he strengthened his experience on building, shipping, marketing and delivering new products to market.

He’s a Computer Science graduate by the Universitat Politècnica de València and holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

Daniel is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Sachem Partners. His professional experiences include five years of entrepreneurship where he gained valuable hands-on practice conceptualizing, launching, operating and exiting a business. Additionally, Daniel also spent four years in the financial services industry where he worked analyzing capital markets, making direct investments, and advising institutions and high net-worth individuals. During this period, Daniel deepened his experience related to assessing risk, driving sales and forging client relationships.

Daniel holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the Universidad Simón Bolivar in Venezuela, and an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

AI Global is an international investment company with interests in multiple long-term asset classes, including search funds, private equity, and late-stage ventures that are spearheaded by highly motivated, talented entrepreneurs. The firm brings value by working closely with its partners throughout all of the phases of any project or investment as well as leveraging on its international network of experts and collaborators. The company is a very active global Search Fund investor.

José Moreno is the Managing Partner of the firm. Previously, José was a Junior Partner in ECM Corporate Finance, a Spanish boutique that provides financial advisory services to CFOs and CEOs of small and medium-sized companies as well as family businesses on financial planning, special situations, fundraising and IPO processes. He also worked in several technology start-ups in Germany and Spain and began his career as a Business Analyst at British American Tobacco (BAT) based out of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

José holds a Bachelor of Science in Electronic and Computer Engineering from Tecnológico de Monterrey and a Master in Business Administration (MBA) from IESE Business School. He is also an alumnus of the CEMS-MIM program (Bocconi & HEC Paris).

Istria Capital is a private investment fund based in Madrid, focused on investments in Search Funds. Its founders are Simón Bores and Ignacio Olavarría, founders of Search Fund Spain, an initiative dedicated to promoting the Search Fund model in Spain.

Simón is also the CEO of Lakut Inversiones. Previously, Simón developed his career as a lawyer at Latham & Watkins, Howrey and Uría Menéndez. Simón holds a Law Degree from Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and a Master of European Law (LLM) from College of Europe and an MBA from INSEAD.

Ignacio is a Telecommunications Engineer from the Universidad de Sevilla and has an MBA from INSEAD. Previously, Ignacio developed his professional career as a consultant in Daemon Quest and Ernst & Young.

MAYRIT Capital Partners is an investment firm focused mainly on the acquisition of shares in small and medium-sized companies, as well as Search Funds.

Bietou Capital is a is a private investment company based in South Africa. The company invests in a wide array of alternative investments and typically provides capital and support to small and medium sized companies as well as Search Funds. The company is run by a small group of seasoned investment professionals with extensive industry experience in Private Equity and Venture Capital markets around the world.

Bietou Capital is capitalized with permanent capital which provides the company the ability to take a long-term investment view. The company also enjoys flexibility on their investment mandate and evaluates each opportunity on a deal by deal basis. Their approach is based on that of a partnership and work closely with their portfolio companies and/or fund managers.

For the past 32 years, Blake has focused on private equity investments with Leucadia National Corporation, the Channel Investment Group, Generation Ventures, The Fremont Group and Partner Ventures.  In addition to his role as Managing Director of Partner Ventures, Blake is the Managing General Partner of Fremont Ventures, the private equity growth-capital fund of the Fremont Group.  Fremont Ventures was named by EETimes as one of the top 10 venture capital firms in the US for adding value to portfolio companies.  Partner Ventures invests in later stage growth companies, either as a ‘direct secondary’ investor or through search funds.

Blake joined Bain & Company in 1978, and was one of the founders of the San Francisco Bain office.  In 1983, he joined the Brae Corporation division of Leucadia National Corporation (NYSE – LUK) as Vice President of Strategic Planning, and subsequently founded and managed the acquisition group for Leucadia.

Blake graduated from Dartmouth College in 1975 with high honors in English and Economics as a Rufus Choate Scholar where he was awarded the Henley Economics Prize.  He received his MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business in 1979 and is a Certified Public Accountant.

Blake lives in Portola Valley, California.  He is a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization and is an adjunct professor at IE Business School in Madrid, Spain, one of Europe’s leading business schools, where he teaches highly rated courses on Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital and Entrepreneurial Acquisition (Search Funds).  Blake received the Award for Teaching Excellence from IE in each of the last 7 years.  He is also on the IE Business School International Advisory Board.  Blake is on the boards of Cereve and eSilicon and an advisor to Adara Venture Partners, and Akkadian Ventures.  He is also highly engaged in the search fund community, both domestically and internationally.

JB46 Investment Partners (JB46) is an investment vehicle for Search Funds, whose fundamental mission is to help the searcher in its entrepreneurial effort, with the aim of achieving full success, not only financial but also managerial. The JB46 team is made up of top professionals with a long and proven experience in the financial and business sector, who will focus on providing entrepreneurs and investors with all kinds of tools and advice to achieve success.

Jose María Jerez and Francisco Galiana are part of the original team that has promoted, created and invested in JB46, and are part of its Executive Committee. After many successful years at Banco Santander and other international banks, its focus has shifted to the real economy and to the world of entrepreneurship where not only they participate in the initiative that represents JB46 but also in others closely linked to the world of startups and acceleration of new companies.

Mr. Asen graduated from Harvard College in 1966. He spent many years in the venture capital industry, successfully managing a family of funds for a wealthy New York investor.  He is currently investing solely for his personal account, managing a portfolio of public and private equity investments.  He sits on several corporate boards as well as several not-for-profit boards.

Robert Dahl is a Managing Director at WRD Capital. From 1999 until 2006, Mr. Dahl served as the head of Global Healthcare for the Carlyle Group, a leading private equity firm with over $50 billion of equity under management, where he was responsible for the firm’s investments in the healthcare field. During his tenure at Carlyle, Mr. Dahl served on the investment committee of the U.S. buyout funds, including the $7.9 billion Carlyle Partners IV and the $3.9 billion Carlyle Partners III funds. Mr. Dahl also served on the investment committee of the $430 million Carlyle Mezzanine Partners.

Prior to Carlyle, Mr. Dahl served as co-head of healthcare investment banking in North America at Credit Suisse First Boston. Earlier in his career Mr. Dahl was a CPA for Price Waterhouse. Mr. Dahl is a graduate of the Harvard Business School, where he was elected a Baker Scholar and received a Loeb Rhodes fellowship. He received a B.A. from Middlebury College.

Antonio Carranceja coursed a BBA in Universidad Autónoma de Madrid from 1980 to 1985. In 1990 he obtained a PhD in Business Administration by the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. In 1991 he obtained the degree of Profesor Titular de Universidad. He has been a part-time professor in Universidad Autónoma de Madrid since 1985, teaching different subjects: Financial Maths, Corporate Finance, Financial Markets and Introduction to Finance.

He joined Société Générale in 1992 as a proprietary trader in the Markets division in Madrid. In 1996 he was promoted to Head of Fixed Income trading and sales in Iberia, covering Spain, Portugal and Andorra. In 2009 he was promoted to Head of Markets division in Madrid. He was running a 35 people team including traders, sales and analysts. His direct responsibility was the management of the equity trading books in Spanish stocks and the distribution budget of Capital Market products for Iberian customers.  In 2015 he was named Member of the board of Altura Markets SV SA, the biggest Futures and Options broker in Spain, a joint-venture between Société Générales and BBVA. In February 2017 he left Société Générale and Altura focussing on his education activities and in his private equity investments.

Vonzeo finances and invests in entrepreneurs that are looking to acquire, build and grow a long lasting, sustainable business. Vonzeo and its operating companies enjoy the support of CEOs, Ex CEOs and academics with a strong practitioners’ focus. Vonzeo’s present and former CEOs have excellent operational expertise and provide important strategic and financial insights. Vonzeo’s academics have a profound understanding of cutting-edge research that will be relevant when running companies.

Jan Simon oversees the investment of Vonzeo in Sachem Partners. For over a decade Jan worked in the financial industry including Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and Salomon Brothers. Jan has invested in private and public markets, advised and raised public capital across multiple industries in Europe and North America.

His expertise is in the areas of: investment strategies, entrepreneurial finance and mergers and acquisitions for both European and North American markets. He has managed money in equities, fixed income and advised hedge funds in a variety of strategies. He has been a Special Limited Partner to Pacific Lake Partners, advising the firm on their investments in international search funds and acquisitions.

In addition, since 2003 he has been teaching at graduate schools in Europe and North America.  He is a Visiting Professor at IESE Business School, a Senior Lecturer at Beedie School of Business and has been a Visiting Scholar at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Jan has designed and delivered Executive custom courses at IESE and INSEAD. He has won numerous Teaching Awards and The Economist rated him as one of the Top #20 Business School Professors in the world.

Jan holds a LL.B. and LL.M. from the Katholieke Universtiteit Leuven, a MBA from IESE Business School and earned his Ph.D. in Finance from the University of Essex. He served the first battalion Para-Commando as well as NATO’s Special Intervention Forces. He holds both Commando A and Parachutist A military certificates.

Kinderhook Partners manages a concentrated portfolio of long-term investments in public and private companies that have both the potential to grow substantially in value and management teams whose interests are closely aligned with shareholders. Kinderhook considers investment opportunities in a variety of industries, focusing on companies that have the potential for attractive margins and a high and sustainable return on equity. Tushar Shah oversees Kinderhook’s investment in Sachem Partners.

Prior to co-founding Kinderhook Partners in 2003, Tushar was a Principal at Geocapital Partners, a venture capital firm. Before Geocapital, Tushar was a strategy consultant with the Monitor Group. Tushar was also a WorldTeach volunteer in Ecuador. Tushar is a CFA charterholder and received a B.A. in Economics from Williams College.

León is an investor in private and public companies, as well as in real estate through Alcarama Proyectos Inmobiliarios S.L. León is also a member of the Board of Directors of Repli, the first company to be acquired by a Search Fund in Spain. Previously, Leon founded and was Managing Director and CIO of BBVA & Partners A.V., a company dedicated to the management of Hedge Funds. Leon was also Managing Director and Head of Proprietary Trading at Banco Santander, and Treasurer and Member of the Board of Directors of Bank Of America S.A. in Spain.

Leon is a graduate of the Universidad Comercial de Deusto, and holds an MBA from IESE Business School.