Private Equity

Private Equity Research Consortium (PERC) is an assemblage of academic researchers and industry professionals dedicated to advancing research on private equity and credit. Our core mission is to develop a better understanding of how private capital investments affect both financial results and broader economic outcomes.

PERC, organized through IPC, was established in 2012 by scholars from the business schools at the University of Chicago, Duke University, UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Oxford, and the University of Virginia as well as other institutions who recognized challenges facing empirical research on private equity. PERC supports academic studies by researchers all over the world by facilitating access to data for scholars. For example, PERC has an exclusive arrangement with Burgiss to provide access to data for academic research. The Burgiss dataset includes 9,000 funds, 6.5 trillion in assets. It is sourced directly from limited partners and contains full performance histories of cash flows at the fund level. The Burgiss dataset represents the largest and most in-depth dataset of its kind on venture, buyout, and real estate funds available for academic research.

PERC periodically accepts applications from academic researchers for access to Burgiss private equity fund data.

Latest Private Equity Research

Asset Allocation with Private Equity

January 25, 2022

We survey the literature on the private equity partnership arrangement from the perspective of an outside investor (limited partner). We examine how the partnership arrangement ﬁts into a broader portfolio of investments, and we consider the methods and diﬃculties in performance measurement, both at the fund level and at the asset class level. We follow with a discussion of performance persistence and the skill and pricing power of both general and limited partners. More

The Future of Private Equity – PERC Roundtable

November 22, 2021

At IPC's May 2021 Private Equity Research Symposium, a roundtable discussion convened to discuss the Future of Private Equity. The academic discussion featured Tim Jenkinson (Oxford University’s Saïd Business School), Bob Harris (UVA's Darden School of Business), Victoria Ivashina (Harvard Business School), and Per Stromberg (Stockholm School of
Economics). Our industry panel featured Petra Bukovec (Panetheon), Alex Rogers (HarbourVest), and Frank McKinniry (Vanguard). More

Capital Structure and Leverage in Private Equity Buyouts

November 22, 2021

A new study designed to shed light on the various kinds of debt now used to finance buyout transactions, and to provide some current insights on the profitability and leverage of such transactions using newly available data. Authors: Greg Brown (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), Robert Harris (University of Virginia), and Shawn Munday (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill). More

Advisory Board

Greg Brown

Research Director, IPC; Professor of Finance, Sarah Graham Kenan Distinguished Scholar, University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School

Keith Crouch

Director, Product Management, Burgiss

Robert S. Harris

PERC Director, C. Stewart Sheppard Professor of Business Administration, University of Virginia, Darden School

Yael Hochberg

Ralph S. O'Connor Professor in Entrepreneurship (Finance); Head, Rice University Entrepreneurship Initiative

Tim Jenkinson

Professor of Finance, Oxford University, Said Business School

Steven Kaplan

Neubauer Family Distinguished Service Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance, University of Chicago, Booth School of Business

David Robinson

Professor of Finance and J. Rex Fuqua Distinguished Professor of International Management, Duke University, Fuqua School of Business

Reiner Braun

Chair, Entrepreneurial Finance 2, Technische Universität München

Nick Crain

Senior Lecturer, University of Melbourne, Faculty of Business and Economics

Michael Ewens

Assoc. Professor of Finance and Entrepreneurship, California Institute of Technology

Will Gornall

Assistant Professor of Finance, University of British Columbiam, Sauder School of Business

Oleg Gredil

Assistant Professor of Finance, Tulane University, A. B. Freeman School of Business

Sabrina Howell

Associate Professor of Finance, New York University Stern School of Business

Victoria Ivashina

Lovett-Learned Chaired Professor of Finance, Harvard Business School

Arthur Korteweg

Dean's Associate Professor in Business Administration, Associate Professor of Finance and Business Economics, University of Southern California, Marshall School of Business

Josh Lerner

Schiff Professor of Investment Banking, Harvard Business School

Stefan Morkoetter

Professor of Finance, University of St.Gallen

Adair Morse

Associate Professor of Finance, UC Berkeley Haas School of Business

Ludovic Phalippou

Associate Professor of Finance, University of Oxford, Saïd Business School

Antoinette Schoar

Koerner Professor of Finance, MIT Sloan School of Management

Berk Sensoy

Hans Stoll Professor of Finance, Vanderbilt University, Owen Graduate School of Management

Morten Sorensen

Head of Finance Department, Copenhagen Business School; Adjunct Associate Professor of Business, Columbia Business School

Ilya Strebulaev

The David S. Lobel Professor of Private Equity; Professor of Finance; Director, Stanford Venture Capital Initiative, Graduate School of Stanford Business

Per Stromberg

SSE Centennial Professor of Finance and Private Equity, Stockholm School of Economics; Adjunct Professor of Finance, Booth Business School, University of Chicago

Michael Weisbach

Ralph W. Kurtz Chair in Finance, Ohio State University, Fisher College of Business

Ayako Yasuda

Professor of Finance, UC Davis