Bespoke Partners Receives Strategic Investment from AEA Growth

Bespoke Partners, a leading provider of retained executive search and leadership advisory services for enterprise software companies, today announced that the firm has received a strategic investment from AEA Growth.

“We are excited to collaborate with the team at AEA Growth to enhance our services and deliver even greater value to our clients,” said Bespoke Founder Kristie Nova. “The investment team brings deep expertise in technology-enabled professional services and retained search that will help us continue to grow and scale while continuing to deliver unparalleled client satisfaction.”

“Bespoke Partners is a best-in-class retained executive search firm due to its high-performance team culture and committed focus on the enterprise software market for over a decade,” said Ravi Sarin, Co-Head and Partner of AEA Growth. “We see tremendous growth potential for Bespoke as it scales its team and further leverages technology to drive high-quality placements and human capital advisory services for its clients.”

Eric Walczykowski has assumed the CEO role after serving as President over the last 18 months. During his tenure as President, he formalized the Executive Leadership, Senior Leadership and Partner teams who have taken on significant management responsibilities.

Kristie added, “I could not be more excited about Eric’s appointment as CEO, as well as this tremendous milestone which is a direct reflection of the world-class team of search, leadership advisory, operations and support professionals at Bespoke Partners. I can truly say that I am better by virtue of this team, and we are thrilled to be partnering with AEA Growth. The fund’s culture and philosophy align to our values and we have a shared view that being the best at people will allow us to achieve any goal we set forth for the company.”

Kristie will remain Founding Partner of Bespoke Partners. In this position, she will continue to develop key relationships with the firm’s growing client base as well as mentor the Bespoke team.

“This is a very exciting moment for Bespoke,” Eric said. “I am looking forward to working closely with our outstanding team and to partnering with AEA as we head into the next chapter for Bespoke Partners.”

BrightTower, a New York City-headquartered investment banking and M&A advisory services firm, served as exclusive advisor to Bespoke Partners.

Hunt Scanlon Ventures, a Connecticut-based executive search advisory firm, served as an advisor to AEA Growth.

The strategic investment caps a period of unprecedented growth and service expansion for Bespoke, which is the leading firm focused solely on executive search and leadership advisory for private equity backed software companies. After celebrating its 10^th anniversary last year, Bespoke has grown to nearly 100 employees and recently placed its 800^th executive.

About Bespoke Partners

Bespoke Partners is the leading firm focused exclusively on executive recruiting and leadership advisory services for private equity backed enterprise software companies.

More than 90% of the most active private equity software investors in the US have relied on Bespoke for leadership recruiting and advisory. Bespoke transformed leadership at portfolio companies achieving buyout transactions totaling more than $25 billion in 2021 alone.

Bespoke’s unique, data-driven services complete searches in typically half the industry average time with a 99% placement success rate.

The firm has offices in San Diego, Austin and Philadelphia and provides human capital services spanning the deal cycle from due diligence to leadership build-out to exit readiness. To learn more visit bespokepartners.com.

About AEA Growth

AEA Growth provides technology-enabled, healthcare and software companies with flexible capital and operational resources to accelerate growth. AEA Growth targets investments in category leading, capital efficient businesses with strong customer advocacy.

AEA Growth is part of AEA Investors LP. AEA Investors was founded in 1968 by the Rockefeller, Mellon and Harriman family interests and S.G. Warburg & Co. as a private investment vehicle for a select group of industrial family offices with substantial assets. AEA has an extraordinary global network built over many years which includes leading industrial families, business executives and leaders; many of whom invest with AEA as active individual investors and/or join its portfolio company boards or act in other advisory roles. Today, AEA’s approximately 100 investment professionals operate globally with offices in New York, Stamford, San Francisco, London, Munich and Shanghai. The firm manages funds that have approximately $17 billion of invested and committed capital including the leveraged buyouts of middle market companies and small business companies, growth capital and mezzanine and senior debt investments.

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