Sun Capital Partners, the Florida based mega private equity firm was featured in a lengthy article in the October issue of Bloomberg magazine.  The article traces Sun’s roots back to 1995 when founders Marc Leder and Rodger Krouse set-up shop as an unfunded investment firm.  Experiencing many of the issues facing any new firm, (i.e. lack of awareness and funding), it took the pair 20 months before making their first acquisition.

However, Sun quickly developed a formula that worked; acquiring - fixing - flipping smaller troubled companies, and now claim 200 such transactions under their belt.  So how does a firm get to such lofty numbers?

In looking at Sun’s 2007 transaction report, the firm had 12 disposals and made an astonishing 39 acquisitions (27 new platform companies and 12 add-ons).

The Firm’s 2008 numbers haven’t hinted at what would be an expected slowdown.  Sun’s mid-year report lists 5 disposals and 16 acquisitions (8 platform, 8 add-on). It remains to be seen how things play out given the current merger climate.

If there’s such a thing as a private equity bellwether, Sun Capital would be it.