The industry is in a "cautious boom." After the 2022-2023 rate shock, deal activity roared back in 2025 — global PE investment hit a four-year high, and the largest LBO in history ($56.5B take-private of EA) closed in January 2026. But the old playbook of buying cheap, loading up debt, and flipping is dead. With borrowing costs at 8-10% all-in, returns now depend on actually growing the business. That's the conference theme in a nutshell: Beyond the Multiple.
The Fed cut rates three times in late 2025 to the 3.5-3.75% range, breaking the "deal dam." But rates are still roughly double the pre-2022 era, so equity contributions in buyouts have climbed to 45-55% of deal value. Translation: PE firms have to put more of their own skin in the game.
Steve Frary's story is a masterclass in PE-backed operational leadership. He ran Oriental Trading Company — one of the nation's largest direct-mail merchants of party supplies and novelties — through multiple PE ownership cycles before it was acquired by Berkshire Hathaway (Warren Buffett) in 2012. That's the ultimate validation: Buffett doesn't buy companies unless the operator has built something durable.
The headline session. Two Dartmouth '87 classmates — one who advises the world's largest PE firms on strategy, the other who deploys billions in actual deals — share a stage. Expect a "state of the industry" framing with real tension between the consultant's macro view and the practitioner's deal-level reality.
Four PE investors spanning mega-cap ($94B Advent) to specialist lower-mid-market firms. The "Impact" in the title signals this won't just be about returns — expect discussion of how PE firms justify their social license and the push to show value creation beyond financial engineering.
The VC side: AI-focused investing (Innospark), biotech (stealth-mode company), and sports/entertainment VC (SeventySix). This is the "frontier" panel — earlier-stage, higher-risk bets. Timely given that AI captured 50% of all global VC funding in 2025 ($211B), with five companies alone (OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, Scale AI, Project Prometheus) raising $84B.
This is the "how PE actually makes money now" panel. With all-in borrowing costs at 8-10% and equity checks up to 45-55% of deal value, firms need operating partners who roll up their sleeves — driving revenue growth, cutting costs, professionalizing management. These three do that daily across three continents.
Arguably the most compelling personal story of the conference. Jindal became the youngest partner in Comcast Ventures history, spent 7 years between Bessemer and Comcast, then launched her own AI-native fund in October 2025 and raised $32M in six months. She represents the next generation of VC.
Sugar Free Capital focuses on "AI-native infrastructure" — companies in Physical AI, Gaming, Defense, and AI infra. This is not "AI wrapper" investing; it's technical founders building foundational technology. She picks a new theme each quarter to focus on.
This panel follows the money upstream. You'll hear from the people who raise funds (GPs), the people who allocate capital to those funds (LPs like Dartmouth's endowment), and the middlemen who connect them (placement agents). A rare behind-the-curtain look at how billion-dollar funds get capitalized.
Context: fundraising remains bifurcated. Top-quartile mega-funds (Blackstone, KKR, Apollo) close at or above targets, while emerging and mid-market managers face extended timelines. LP frustration with slow distributions is the dominant theme — 46% of GPs now use continuation vehicles to speed up distributions (double from last year).
Same room, new panel — the founders' perspective. These are people who started PE firms from scratch, not just investors at established shops. Expect candid talk about raising a first-time fund, convincing family-owned businesses to sell, and the realities of building in the lower middle market.
The two hottest corners of alternative assets. Private credit has exploded to $3 trillion as banks pulled back from lending — Morgan Stanley projects it will hit $5T by 2029. Secondaries hit record volume ($150B+ in 2025) as LPs desperate for liquidity sell fund stakes. This panel covers both.
I'm an analyst and writer focused on how transformative technology reshapes economies, institutions, and everyday life. My background spans the private sector and national security — I've done economic analysis at the CIA, policy research at CSIS, strategy consulting at Lake Partners, and was employee #1 at a defense tech startup.
I write a Substack called Maximizing — essays on how grand technologies (AI, social media, cloud computing) affect real life. I'm interested in the patterns that persist for decades, not the hype cycles that burn out in months.
Dartmouth College, B.A. in Government modified with Economics, Magna Cum Laude. Rufus Choate Scholar (top 5%). Also studied at the London School of Economics. Former D1 heavyweight rower and 200-hour registered yoga teacher.
My Substack explores how transformative technology influences everyday life. Recent focus on AI adoption patterns, the geopolitics of big tech, and what "grand technologies" — innovations that persist for decades — mean for how we work, think, and relate to each other.