KKR founder Kravis: The King of acquisitions wants to take Buffett's path

Kravis: "The King of Acquisitions" wants to take Mr Buffett's road Kravis (Henry R.kravis), the veteran leveraged buy-out guru, who founded the KKR Group (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts &co. l.p.　　is one of the oldest and most experienced private equity institutions in the world. The New York Central Park has a panoramic view from his office library overlooking the window. The front of the library is a big picture frame hanging on the west wall, with a wall chart dotted with the logos of KKR's companies involved in trading: Safeway (Duracell, US supermarket group), Golden Overlord (the leading battery company in the United States), RJR Nabisco (RJR Nabisco, American food and tobacco industry ...　　In the middle of the wall chart is a yellow deposit voucher-a 10,000-dollar cheque account that was opened at the Dow Bank in 1976 when the company was founded. As of March 31, 2009, KKR has launched and managed 14 private equity funds totaling $59.3 billion trillion. KKR now holds 51 companies, according to statistics at the end of 2009, with annual sales totaling $218 billion trillion, or at least twice times more than companies such as Blackstone, the rival Blackstone Group.　　The 66-Year-old Kravis is worth about 3.8 billion dollars.　　Now the acquisition guru is making major changes to his more than 30-year KKR Group, hoping to emulate Mr. Buffett and his financial group Berkshire Hathaway, Berkshire Hathaway, to open up new avenues for private equity investment. "We are not only PE, but also an asset management group." "For me, I need to think and act like an industrialist," Kravis said. "There seems to be no one to follow Buffett's jealousy, even in the private-equity industry has the Godfather status of the Kravis is no exception." Especially in the aftermath of the financial crisis, he has been proud of the "leveraged buyout" business has been difficult.　　In 2008-2009, 543 private equity firms in the United States have gone bankrupt, including 2 KKR companies, and KKR's earnings have been hammered, according to IQ, an industry agency. Private equity investment companies have a good time earlier. They can easily raise money from investors, borrow from banks, use the funds to merge companies, comb and arrange their finances, and then arrange for listings and quick profits for the companies they buy. "These days are gone forever.　　Kravis said in a media interview last December. Kravis decided to take the initiative to seek change. In his view, Buffett's Berkshire is able to gallop in all areas of his liking, and does not need to raise money from outside, because the company has a large number of nowGold and highly valued listed company stocks. Its acquisition enterprise model is no less than the perfect private equity investment model.　　He hopes KKR will have the same advantage in the future. He began pushing KKR to the market, hoping to make acquisitions with new shares.　　This March, KKR has submitted a listing application to the NYSE, which plans to raise $2.2 billion trillion. But it has to be admitted that it is not so easy for Kravis to emulate Mr. Buffett. The biggest difference between KKR and Berkshire is that the latter has 32 years of insurance as a source of strength, allowing the latter to form 110 billion of billions of dollars in assets that KKR cannot do in any short time. In addition, Mr. Buffett has been in the business of mergers and acquisitions for decades, with the company relying entirely on capital rather than debt, and KKR is just starting to do it. [Page] In addition to the IPO financing plan, Kravis also aggressively expands beyond the leveraged buy-out business. "If the business you're doing is just buying a company, you're going to miss out on a lot of other opportunities to make money," he said. Our task today is to create value. "As early as 2006, Kravis began to create KKR internal investment banks to serve the group's investment companies." Kravis hired the former general manager of Citigroup Capital Markets, Craig J. Farr, to form the group. The internal investment bank, which initially financed KKR's acquisitions, then sought refinancing for the company when KKR held a company, eventually helping the company to go public when it was ready to sell the company. Kravis does not expect the sector to be among the world's well-established investment banks, such as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.　　His goal is simply to serve KKR companies, get better loan terms and save money that would otherwise be paid to bankers. In November 2008, KKR's internal investment bank became the IPO main underwriter of Dollar General (KKR Holdings), a landmark event.　　Dollar eventually raised 716 million of billions of dollars and KKR received 10 million dollars in underwriting services.　　The KKR strategy also includes a focus on minority shareholder equity and joint ventures with other companies in a wider industry. For Kravis, the biggest challenge to the business strategy adjustment comes from internal opinion. KKR's traditional investors want it to remain focused on mergers and acquisitions and trading. "I'm not against the KKR approach. "But if it's too much, I wonder if he's investing all the PE money in other capital markets," says one KKR investor.　　"But Morgan Stanley's Ceojohn, Kravis, agreed that private equity investment should have a broader business, not just buying and restructuring companies." PE Pioneer Although KKR began to seek diversification, but its core business is still company mergers and acquisitions. Login to KKRDivision's website, the first to see the propaganda language is "We are PE pioneer (we are PE pioneer)". "For a long time, people bought assets by offering a small amount of money and the rest relying on loans," Kravis said. But most people buy homes and small businesses in this way, and the way we start is going to get bigger profits.　　"The 80 's, Kravis is looking for companies that run into trouble or are undervalued but with very lucrative potential, but the money they need to buy is often only one of their own, with the rest lending to banks or issuing junk bonds, which is the current leveraged buy-out of private-equity funds.　　1988-1989 years, Kravis bought food and tobacco companies at a price of more than 30 billion dollars, RJR--the combining not only sits on the highest-paid combining throne for more than 10 years, but goes into a best-selling book called "The Barbarian at the door" and a film of the same name. There are also Kravis's cousin and business partner George Roberts (George Roberts). Together they went to college in California State, and after graduation, they started a financial career with Bear Stearns. The cousins set up an investment firm KKR in 1976. Although their personalities are different, Roberts is more reserved, and Kravis is glamorous, but the combination of two people is perfect. Years of convergence have made them very tacit. Kravis said: "The last time we disagreed, it was in 1951 that we quarreled over a bicycle." ”