Ardian promotes head of SF office – exclusive

Will Small, a senior investment manager at Ardian who also leads its San Francisco office, was promoted to director.

The promotion was effective in January, according to his LinkedIn account and confirmed by a person familiar with the matter. He joins Daryl Li, the other director at Ardian US, who is based in New York.

Small has quickly risen through the ranks of the Paris-based investment company since he joined Ardian as an analyst in 2011, shortly after graduating from Princeton University.

He became an investment manager in 2014 and a senior investment manager in the firm’s fund of funds team in July of the following year. In September 2015, he was picked to lead Ardian’s newly-opened San Francisco office.

Small began his career as a summer analyst at BlackRock Private Equity partners in 2010.

Ardian makes primary, secondaries and direct investments. Its latest fund of funds closed in April on $14 billion, which included $10.8 billion for secondaries investments. The fund was about 25 percent invested as of the end of the year.

The French firm also launched a US mid-market buyout arm in October with the partnership with Seven Mile Capital Partners, which it helped spin out of Citigroup five years ago and which is seeking to raise between $500 million and $600 million for its Ardian North American II fund.

Ardian, which is led by Dominique Senequier, has $55 billion in managed or advised assets in Europe, North America and Asia.

Ardian was not immediately available to comment.