1. Why Blackhawk Partners?
Blackhawk’s partners have substantial operating, trading and financial experience in merchant banking, private equity, alternative investments and physical commodities trading.
Having access to people in the intelligence, business, political and financial communities in key countries around the globe; including but not limited to Russia, China, Bahrain, France, Israel, Kuwait, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Singapore, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom in addition of course to the good old USA, gives the Firm access to a myriad of trading and investment opportunities globally.
We have never heard someone say to us that the reason we are good at what we do is because we are smarter than everyone else. It is all because we want it more, we work harder, we focus more, we sacrifice more, and more importantly, we are a partner with a deep passion for empowering people in making a true difference in their lives and that’s how we are able to create "real wealth"; not funny money.
2. What are Blackhawk Partners investment/trading criteria at large?
Regarding the Firm’s private equity activities
Blackhawk Partners, Inc. is basically a firm that serves as both an advisor to and an investor in its clients. We thus take pride in and are recognized for developing creative solutions, providing funding capabilities in getting the difficult deals done.
The Firm is a genuine, long-term investor; and represents patient capital. It means holding existing investments until markets are high and liquid and exiting at full value and not being forced to panic and sell into a rapidly deleveraging world. And it means becoming aggressive in a declining environment, in which it will deploy its capital to the maximum benefit for its investors when the time is right.
Blackhawk seeks to create value by directing capital toward situations where our investment, strategic insight and operational support can foster transformational changes that maximize the potential of a business. We engage in friendly transactions exclusively and forge partnerships with talented management teams with the objective of achieving exceptional performance over time. We strive to achieve improvements in growth and global competitiveness that benefit not only our investors, but all of society’s stakeholders.
Discipline
Our rigorous investment approach is consistent across all investment types and based on extensive due diligence. We draw upon our substantial transaction and financing expertise and retain a sharp focus on capital preservation while striving to deliver attractive returns. Operational improvement is key to much of the value we create. We are committed to achieving the best long-term outcomes for our businesses and investments.
Breadth
Blackhawk takes a flexible, opportunistic investment approach that is not anchored to any single geography, industry, transaction structure or size. The common denominator is our focus on investments that can drive a value-creating transformation of a business. We are known for focusing our resources on a diverse range of opportunities, such as build-ups, growth capital and buyouts.
Global Scope
Blackhawk is one of a limited number of private equity firms with access to a full range of cross-regional opportunities. We believe our global reach helps us to better assist our portfolio companies in dealing with developments across various regions of the world, sourcing add-on acquisition opportunities, entering new markets and outsourcing operations to reduce costs.
Regarding the Firm’s physical commodities trading activities
Blackhawk Partners is an international marketer of "Petroleum Products", focused on providing a comprehensive fuel and lubricant offering to commercial and industrial industries. As energy deal makers (mostly in D2 Gasoline), innovation and customer service is the hallmark of the Firm’s success. Our basic procedures when dealing with oil related commodities is very simple:
- We want immediate proof of product (POP) before going to the banks and after signature of contracts and our method of payment is a documentary letter of credit. In some cases we would consider a transferable, but will never give a divisible.
- We do not do bank guarantees or standby letters of credit. If proof of product cannot be given, the seller may have the option of putting up a non operative performance bond first.
- We do reciprocate with Proof of Funds (POF), but only between principals and will only deal with sellers who are ready to provide documentation.
3. What are Blackhawk’s general rules of engagement; regarding both its private equity and physical commodities trading lines of business?
Blackhawk’s business is first a people's business. Hence, "full transparency" is key in moving forward with the Firm regarding any business transaction of any size or merit. Hence, we will only deal with groups we have undertaken full "due diligence" on; and this includes but not limited to intelligence gathering, business background and professional affiliations checking, etc….
The Firm will deal with independent consultants, brokers or advisors as long as they have a presence on the Web or at least share with us their full profile. Knowing our Clients (KYC) is the first and most important rule we abide by. Short of that, it’s a no starter unless the people are already personally known to us and our global partners.
4. Given the current market conditions, is it safer to work with large established companies or smaller emerging companies?
We at Blackhawk believe that there is still a big fallacy in today's world; despite all what we've recently witnessed in the US with the demise of real established "financial powerhouses" that "big is safe" and "small is risky". How untrue this is.
What makes a company safe and sound is the character, talent and insight of its management team and not the size of its balance sheet. Besides, with all the institutional pools of capital floating around today, a large company is much more subject to the vagaries of the public market and the whims of aggressive predators than a smaller private company smartly surfing below the radar of such "vultures" and adding value.
So why do some companies achieve sustained high growth in both revenues and profits whatever their size while others don’t?
In a five-year study of high-growth companies and their less successful competitors, researchers found that the answer lies in the way each group approaches "Strategy".
The difference in approach was not a matter of managers choosing one analytical tool or planning model over another. The difference was in the companies' fundamental, implicit assumptions about strategy.
The less successful companies took a conventional approach: their strategic thinking was dominated by the idea of staying ahead of the competition. In stark contrast, the high-growth companies paid little attention to matching or beating their rivals. Instead, they sought to make their competitors irrelevant through a strategic logic called "value innovation"….This is exactly what we at Blackhawk do; tread into territory very few have gone too before but armed with intelligence very few also have access to; hence the unusual opportunities.
5. Does Blackhawk Partners have any geographic limitations in dealing with companies or products outside of the United States of America?
Blackhawk Partners does not view the world according to where the company or product is located as one cannot afford to be provincial anymore; especially in a world that is becoming increasingly global.
We seek cash flow generating companies wherever the company is based and disregarding the industry. At the end of the day, we are in here to back the right operators with a track record of executing. We don't back technologies, industries or themes. We back first and foremost the right people.