NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Star Mountain Capital, LLC, a specialized investment manager with approximately $3.5 billion in assets under management (committed capital including debt facilities as of 8/31/2023) focused on investing in established, private small and medium-sized businesses in the North American lower middle-market, is pleased to announce that Chris Calabrese has increased his involvement with Star Mountain from an Operating Partner to a full-time role of Strategic Portfolio Partner. Star Mountain Senior Advisors / Operating Partners are aligned with Star Mountain’s full-time team and investors by investing their personal capital and sharing in the firm’s carried interest.
“We are excited to expand Chris into this full-time role providing additional value for our investors, portfolio companies and team,” said Brett Hickey, Star Mountain Capital Founder & CEO. “His 30+ years of lower middle-market private credit, risk and portfolio management, as well as overall investment experience will be a great addition to our team.”
“Over the past dozen years, Star Mountain has built an impressive team and investment process tailored to the large and fragmented lower middle-market,” said Chris Calabrese. “I am pleased to be leveraging my experience to further improve best practices across all areas of the firm and particularly within portfolio management.”
Mr. Calabrese will be based in the firm’s Philadelphia office, which is one of Star Mountain’s 11 offices nationwide.
In 2005 Mr. Calabrese co-founded LBC Credit Partners, a lower middle-market private credit investment firm that was acquired by CIFC Asset Management LLC in December 2021. At LBC, he served as a Senior Partner facilitating a team which invested over $5.5 billion in more than 200 lower middle-market companies through 2019. During that time, Chris was an investment committee member and had oversight of the credit, portfolio management and capital markets efforts including a unit that directly managed all active portfolio accounts where he was also involved in complex restructurings and divestitures.
Prior to LBC Credit Partners, Mr. Calabrese was a Managing Director at Wachovia (now part of ~$2 trillion Wells Fargo) where he was Head of Business Development and Underwriting as well as Member of Senior Credit Committee.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Calabrese was a Senior Vice President at First Union Bank (now part of ~$2 trillion Wells Fargo) where he led a team of commercial loan originators, underwriters and portfolio managers for leveraged loan products including asset-based lending. Prior to First Union Bank he was a Vice President at Meridian Bank. Mr. Calabrese obtained formal credit training in banking and corporate finance at Mellon Bank where he started his career in 1986.
Mr. Calabrese holds a Master of Business Administration from Drexel University and a Bachelor of Science in Management with a minor in Accounting (magna cum laude) from Widener University.
About Star Mountain
With approximately $3.5 billion in assets under management (committed capital including debt facilities as of 8/31/2023), Star Mountain takes a data-driven approach to investing into the North American lower middle-market through two complementary investment strategies: (i) direct debt and equity investing and (ii) secondaries (acquiring LP interests and direct assets and making primary LP commitments) and NAV loans to funds. Star Mountain believes these complementary strategies provide data-enhanced, scalable, diversified, and customizable access for its institutional and high-net-worth investors to established businesses that generally have at least $15 million in annual revenues and under $50 million in EBITDA. Its investors include public pensions, private pensions, insurance companies, commercial banks, endowments, foundations, family offices and high-net-worth individuals. Star Mountain is 100% employee-owned and shares its profits with 100% of its U.S. full-time employees as part of its focus on maximizing value for its stakeholders and investors through alignment of interests.
Since 2010 through August 2023, Star Mountain has made over 200 direct investments in businesses and over 40 secondary / fund investments within its Collaborative Ecosystem®, focused on the North American lower middle-market. One of Star Mountain’s specialties is seeking current cash income for investors that is materially above the typical yields found in the public markets, often accompanied with potential long-term capital gains equity returns and low correlation to public markets through its distinctive origination, underwriting and value-added investment capabilities.
Star Mountain was recently named one of the Inc. 5000 fastest-growing private companies in America.
