Written by 4:08 am Interviews

Sharvil Patel | Premji Invest

Sharvil currently works at Norwest Venture Partners. At the time of this interview, he worked at Premji Invest. Prior to joining Premji Invest, Sharvil was at o3 Capital in their healthcare investment banking vertical from 2019 to 2020. Sharvil is a qualified Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India and holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from H.R College of Commerce and Economics (University of Mumbai). Sharvil will be sharing his experience from his stint at Premji Invest focusing on sharing insights about the Private Equity industry in India.

Interview

How did you recruit for this role? What would your advice be for potential candidates aspiring to get here? (recruiting strategy, cycle, process etc.)

Most PE/VC firms engage with recruitment consultants for openings at the pre-MBA role as well as the post-MBA associate role. Having said that, it is also important to build your own network amongst PE professionals whilst interacting with them when you are an investment banker i.e on the sell side – this would also help candidates learn about various buy-side openings as and when they come up.

In my case, I learnt about the opening at the particular fund and applied directly, by getting in touch with a member from the fund’s investment team.

The typical recruitment process will involve anywhere between 4-7 rounds of interviews (depending upon the size and structure of the fund the candidate is interviewing at). A Financial Modelling aka a case study round will also be scheduled once the candidate has cleared the initial few rounds of interviews. Again, depending on the fund, you will get anywhere between 4 hours to a day to prepare and submit the Financial Model and a short, crisp presentation accompanying the same.

What are the key skills that are required for this role? 

In random order, an investment professional would require strong technical knowledge in the field of corporate finance, valuations, familiarity and knack of understanding numbers, and joining dots and stories via numbers and research by usage of analytical skills. At the analyst and associate level, once typically works across sectors and hence, familiarity with KPI’s metrics pertaining to each industry would be an added bonus since it helps in asking the right type of questions. Goes without saying, excel and ppt skills need to be top notch, since the expectation is to turn around complex models and sharp, crisp, data driven slides within rigid timelines

What is the typical feeder profile (typical previous work experience) for this industry in general and for your firm in particular?

For the industry, the typical feeder profile varies from fund to fund. Some funds only hire consultants from MBB and do not look at Investment Banking profiles, while other funds prefer candidates with investment banking experience since they are well acquainted with making Financial Models and Information Memorandums. In my personal experience, I have noticed that age also plays a role – with a few funds preferring younger candidates with a little lesser experience for the entry level roles

Is there an education path that is preferred for getting a role in this industry?

There is no particular education path needed, the focus is more on prior work experience being relevant to the fund’s profile. Today, most funds have a mix of investment professionals from varying background such as BCOM from SRCC/other Universities, Engineers, Chartered Accountants and CFA charter holders

What is your total team size and what is the typical team staffing on a case/deal?

The team size is about 15 individuals containing a mix of analysts, associates, senior associates, VPs, Principals, MDs and Chief Investment Officer. Most funds also have Operating Partners, industry advisors who sit on the IC committee.

One a particular deal about 3 people would be staffed (Principal/VP, Senior Associate/Associate and an Analyst). More often than not, particular deals would have only 2 people staffed, due to bandwith issues and the sheer quantum of deals each and every investment professional works on

Each and every member has a particular workstream cut out and takes full responsibility for the same

What is a typical day at work for you?

There is no standard/set template for how a day at work would look like. The PE industry is dynamic and rapidly evolving and the same gets reflected in the workstreams. 

Depending on the deal flow and the keenness to pursue a particular deal, an analyst or associate would spend majority of the time on deal evaluation, understanding the collaterals shared, building your own Financial Models, undertaking industry research, doing competitive benchmarking, understanding the underlying rationale of the assumptions taken (in case the deal is being marketed by bankers), doing expert calls to gain insights of the business / industry.

Sometimes, the day gets occupied by attending various types of calls/meetings and hence the aforesaid work is required to be done outside of the usual work hours

A good amount of time is also spent with portfolio companies, since these days most PE funds are active in helping the portfolio companies out with their day-to-affairs particularly on the strategy and growth front

What are your key responsibilities and deliverable on a case/deal?
  • Industry research, deal evaluation, competitive benchmarking
  • Triangulation of levers, growth plans, projections
  • Preparation of the Financial Model and IC note
  • Assistance in analyzing and questioning the findings of various due diligences being undertaken on the deal – Legal, Financial, Commercial, Operational and Environmental – to name a few
What is the typical exit that people get from this role?

Since most funds offer “Pre-MBA” roles to graduates without an MBA – the typical exit would be to go on and pursue your MBA at a B-School of your choice after completing a 2/3 year stint with the fund, as the case may be.

However, sometimes, if the candidate is not keen to pursue an MBA, he/she may also join other funds offering a track role to high performers or take up strategy/corp. dev/M&A roles at funded startups.

What are the pros and cons about this role?

Pros

  • Working on deals across sectors – widens the horizons of your thinking and analytical skills
  • First hand experience of meeting and interacting with founders – learning how they have built large, successful businesses from scratch
  • Instills an ability in you to manage multiple workstreams at once under stringent deadlines
  • Managing, dealing with portfolio companies gives you a bird’s eye view of operations, which is useful from non-consulting backgrounds

Cons

  • Working on a large number of deals at one time may just make you the jack of all but the master of none – it can be mitigated by reading and delving deeper into businesses outside work hours
  • Deal teams are generally very small – hence there is a lot of ownership and reliance  of the work undertaken by an individual with the room for errors/mistakes being negligible
What are your typical work hours in a week (including weekends)?

Generally, a week would involve 70+ hours of work, excluding some hours which would get sprinkled over the weekend. During peak-deal evaluation time / or when the IC note/FM are being prepared, a week (including weekend) can stretch to 100+ hours as well.

How do the responsibilities evolve as one grows in this industry into senior roles?

As one moves up the food chain, the role more focused on building relationships, sourcing deals, structuring the transaction, working on the valuation contours, exiting investments made, building a sub-sector wise investment thesis. Needless to say, overall execution of a deal would fall on the senior folks as well.

What would be your advice for people aspiring for a similar role?
  • Always have the attitude of a “hustler” – build a network of individuals on the buy-side and be on the lookout for opportunities/openings since applying to PE/VC funds at the right time is key. This, along with gaining sector agnostic knowledge is key to crack buy side roles!
  • As Alfred Pennyworth from the Batman Series once said “Why do we fall sir? So that we can learn to pick ourselves up” – one may land up interviewing at multiple funds since competition is fierce and a PE/VC fund would interview atleast 15-20 candidates on an average for one opening. In case of any failures, it is important not to get dejected, but to move ahead positively onto the next interview with learnings from previous interview experiences
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Tags: Last modified: January 14, 2022

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