Carlyle: 1 in 12 employees based in China

One of every 12 employees at The Carlyle Group is based in China, the firm’s founder William Conway said at an industry conference in New York Monday.

Conway didn’t elaborate on how many of Carlyle’s secondaries-focused professionals are based in the region and the firm declined to comment further, however both fund of funds arms in the Carlyle Solutions Group have offices in Hong Kong.

AlpInvest – the Dutch private equity fund of funds Carlyle acquired in 2011 – has 13 investment professionals in Hong Kong, according to its website. In mid-2012, the firm built out its secondaries practice in the region by appointing Neal Costello to lead the business.

“Asia has always been an important market for AlpInvest. As an early private equity investor in the region, we expect our activities to continue to grow in the region,” AlpInvest chairman and chief executive officer Volkert Doeksen said at the time.

Costello left AlpInvest for the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board last year and principal Michael Camacho now leads the firm’s secondaries practice in Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, Metropolitan Real Estate Management, which Carlyle acquired last November only has two professionals in the region: managing directors John So and senior associate Doreen Yu, according to the firm’s website.

Carlyle isn’t the only firm to focus on Asia recently, a steady flow of secondaries professionals have appeared in the region over the last 12 months. Most recently, Jason Sambanju, previously a casualty of the demise of global secondaries firm Paul Capital (which in March said it would wind down its operations) resurfaced as head of Asia secondaries at Deutsche Asset and Wealth Management – a newly created position at the firm.