Kelso & Company, L.P.

Kelso & Company is a North American middle-market private equity firm focused on leveraged buyouts, recapitalizations, and growth capital transactions. The firm invests across a broad range of sectors, including energy, financial services, healthcare, consumer products, industrials, media, communications, manufacturing, and restaurants, targeting companies with enterprise values between $250 million and $2.5 billion and committing $50 million to $600 million of equity per transaction. Transaction types include leveraged buyouts, management buyouts, recapitalizations, growth capital financings, and industry consolidation strategies (roll-ups), with the firm pursuing control-oriented positions and frequently partnering with corporations on carve-out transactions. Kelso also provides mezzanine capital through a joint venture with BlackRock, operated as BlackRock Kelso Capital Corp., a publicly traded business development company. The firm traces its philosophical foundation to founder Louis O. Kelso's development of the employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) concept, emphasizing alignment of interest among management, employees, and shareholders, with Kelso professionals and investment partners maintaining significant personal capital commitments alongside management teams in each transaction. The firm has raised eight private equity funds since 1980, with its most recent fund closing at $2.6 billion to $4.9 billion in available reports, and has completed more than 110 to 140 investments since inception, managing approximately $15 billion to $16 billion of equity capital. Founded in 1971 (originally as Kelso Bangert & Company, with its dedicated private equity platform established in 1980), the firm is headquartered in New York, New York, United States.