Centerview Partners

ABOUT THIS COMPANY:

Small size, big business

In 2006, UBS Vice Chairman Blair Effron had dinner with his friend Robert Pruzan, a veteran and former CEO of Wasserstein Perella. The two men decided to capitalize on the lucrative M&A boom by going in to business together, opening a boutique they dubbed Centerview Partners (the name came from the view at their new office on the 19th floor of Rockefeller Center). At Centerview, there are just two lines of business: M&A advisory and private equity. The advisory business addresses strategic, financial, and operational issues for its clients. Its two subunits are M&A and restructuring. The private equity group focuses on the U.S. consumer middle and upper-middle market. Since Effron and Pruzan’s vision was realized, Centerview has added several additional high-powered bankers and brought total headcount up to more than 150.  Though small in size, Centerview has worked on several huge deals, including Altria’s $113 billion spin off of Philip Morris, Kraft’s $22 billion acquisition of Cadbury, PepsiCo’s $21 billion acquisition of it bottlers, InBev's $52 billion purchase of Anheuser-Busch, Google’s $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility, and Pfizer’s pending $11.85 billion sale of Pediatric Nutrition Business to Nestlé. Overall, during the course of their careers, Centerview’s partners have advised on more than $2 trillion in transactions, including more than $425 billion worth since Centerview was formed.