What is a Search Fund?

• Search funds offer aspiring entrepreneurs with limited capital resources a direct path to owning and managing a small business

• An entrepreneur raises a search fund to support his or her efforts in locating and acquiring a small, profitable, privately held company. Existing owners may be looking to retire or sell for personal reasons

• Search fund investors receive the right but not obligation to participate in the subsequent round of acquisition capital in a pro rata fashion and conversion of the original investment at a stepped up valuation

Resources

• Stanford Graduate School of Business - Search Fund Resources 

• University of Chicago Booth Polsky Center - Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition (ETA) Videos

• IESE - Search Fund Resources

• Podcast series: In the Trenches, Hosted by Steve Divitkos

• Podcast series: Think Like an Owner, Hosted by Alex Bridgeman

• Podcast series: Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition, Hosted by Brian O’Connor

• Podcast series: The Search Fund Podcast, hosted by Jake Nicholson

• “Buy a Promising Small Company and Become Its CEO” (Market Business News, 2019)

• 2018 Search Fund Study: Selected Observations (Stanford GSB, 2018)

• “How CEO’s-In-Waiting Buy Companies They Want To Run (Stanford GSB, 2018)

• “Seek and We Shall Fund” (Economist, 2016)

• “What It Takes to Be A Search Fund Entrepreneur” (Stanford GSB, 2015)

• "Entrepreneurs Use Business School Tool To Buy Companies Globally” (Financial Times, 2015)

• “Search Funds: Best Practices for the Search Phase” (Stanford GSB, 2014)

• “Search Funds: What Has Made Them Work?” (IESE, 2014)

• “The Search Fund Model: How To Become A 28-Year-Old CEO” (Forbes, 2014)

• “Business School Graduates Become Search Fund Entrepreneurs” (US News, 2014)

• “Retiring Boomers Should Consider Selling Their Companies To Millennials” (Harvard Business School Review, 2014)

• “The Evolution of a Search Fund CEO and Company” (Yale School of Management, 2020)