Oak Hill operative jumps to rival firm

Oak Hill Advisors executive Signe Brandt has left the T Rowe Price-owned subsidiary to join a rival alternative asset investor.

Brandt worked at the $63 billion credit-focused Oak Hill for 13 years, building up its Australian presence.

Global Alternative Funds (GAF) has confirmed that Brandt will start with the firm later this month as managing director.

In the new role, Brandt will continue to expand GAF's client base of high-net-worth investors, family offices, endowments and smaller institutions.

Before joining GAF, Brandt worked at Everest Financial Group, Ellerston Capital  and van Eyk Research.

GAF founder and former Carlyle partner Natasha Nankivell highlighted the importance of Brandt's strong technical and manager research background.

She said this skill set is essential in building relationships with its investors and understanding the funds and strategies GAF invests with, noting that GAF invests in all selected funds alongside its clients.

Nankivell founded the firm over four years ago and owns and runs GAF with her brother, ex-Goldman Sachs managing director, Peter Lyneham, to deploy their own family's capital into the best offshore alternative asset managers.

Since its establishment, GAF has grown its assets under management from $12.5 million to $1.2 billion.

She further points out that GAF is not a fund of funds manager nor a capital raising firm, but an investor across the alternative asset classes spectrum, of private credit, private equity, infrastructure and venture capital.

It does not invest in hedge funds, cryptocurrency or natural resources.

Private equity makes up about a third of GAF's investments, with private credit, special situations and distress for control accounting for about 40 per cent.

As for competing in a crowded market, Nankivell said the genesis of many families' capital was private equity as most had owned and operated businesses.

"While they understand the merits of unlisted and private market investments, they haven't necessarily had access to the best alternative asset managers globally," she said.

"It is GAF's role to source, diligence, curate and secure access to what we believe are the best of the best alternative asset managers globally.

"We spend a lot of time focusing on the domain expertise of the managers. Understanding their domain expertise and being able to do deep due diligence on those managers well takes a lot of experience."

Nankivell is a former Macquarie Group head of private capital markets for Asia.

Before that, she held roles at Challenger Financial Services Group, Merrill Lynch International, and Bankers Trust.