Crain’s Chicago Business: Kinzie Capital Raises First Private-Equity Fund

Written by Lynne Marek for Crain’s Chicago Business

The $20 million fund is a rarity: It’s a firm led by a woman in a male-dominated industry.

Chicago-based Kinzie Capital Partners, one of the few private-equity firms founded and led by a woman, has raised its first investment fund, attracting $20 million from high-net-worth individuals and wealthy family offices.

The firm will invest alongside other investors on a deal-by-deal basis, seeking to capitalize up to $50 million in ownership per deal alongside its partners, Kinzie said in a statement today. It is already targeting some investments in U.S. consumer, manufactured products and business services with a focus on the Midwest, said Suzanne Yoon, the firm’s founder and managing partner. She expects the firm to take control positions with the new fund’s investments and deploy the money within 18 months.

She and her partners raised the fund after creating a track record with three minority ownership investments on their own outside the fund over the past couple years. That work helped them attract the new investors to the fund, building on the experience and contacts Yoon and her team had with prior firms, she said.

“It really gave us a leg up having those relationships, given we’re a first-time team and a first-time fund,” she said.

Yoon has been working toward this milestone in raising a fund for much of her career and life, she noted. Kinzie has seven employees and hired Chicago-based Clarity Partners to provide back-office services. Clarity Founder David Namkung is also Yoon’s co-founder and partner of operations at Kinzie.

Original article found here.