Private Equity

Since 1982, The Sterling Group has been partnering with management teams to grow and build winning businesses in the industrial sector. Over 75% of Sterling’s past partnerships have been with family businesses and corporate carve-outs. Sterling excels as a partner where it can bring its operational focus and expertise to a situation. Today, Sterling has over $9 billion in assets under management. Sterling manages two private equity strategies, the Middle Market and Lower Middle Market funds, that target partnerships with industrial companies of different sizes.

Investment Criteria

Corporate carve-outs, family / entrepreneur owned businesses or sponsor owned businesses

Basic industries, including manufacturing, distribution, industrial services and business services

Transaction sizes between $100 million and $1 billion

Equity investments between $50 million and $350 million

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$9B+

Assets under
management

75%

Family businesses or corporate carve-outs

73

Number of
platforms

$25B+

Total value of
transactions

Our Seven Levers℠ Methodology

Businesses we buy
Seven levers℠
Businesses we sell

The Seven Levers℠ are the areas in which we consistently and materially impact businesses.

The seven levers contain our collective experience in operations improvement over nearly 4 decades.
They are based on the principles of continuous improvement.
The seven levers are resources our management teams can use to enable speed, confidence and consistency in business building.

Culture

Since 1982, The Sterling Group has been partnering with management teams to grow and build winning businesses in the industrial sector. Sterling’s founders Gordon Cain and Frank Hevrdejs drew upon their operating and financial backgrounds when establishing Sterling’s strategy and culture. Sterling is proud that our founders’ focus on operations and on partnership are still the core tenets of the Sterling culture today.

Partnership

Since 1982, Sterling has been widely sharing equity and/or options with employees of portfolio companies. Sterling’s founder Gordon Cain wrote a book called “Everybody Wins!”, detailing Sterling’s philosophy on sharing economics and alignment of interest. Sterling has consistently found that this program is a key to forming a true partnership with portfolio company employees. Sterling believes the pace of progress dramatically increases when Sterling and employees are economically aligned and when employees can participate in a successful investment outcome.

Careers

Private Credit