Annual KKR Competition

Note: Students from all backgrounds are encouraged to participate. PE Backgrounds are not required.

All current Columbia Business School students are eligible to participate in the CBS/KKR Private Equity Case Competition

As part of the competition, teams will identify and pitch a company as a Leveraged Buyout ("LBO") candidate and have the opportunity to present to an ‘Investment Committee’ comprised of Executives at KKR.

The competition is held annually with a kick-off event and series of instructional events held by the PE Program prior to the competition submission deadline. The sessions cover finding a company, developing the thesis, valuation, modeling, value creation, exit considerations and more.

The competition is designed to expose students to the world of private equity, work in diverse teams. Each team must include students without traditional PE backgrounds and are partly judged on the diversity of their team.

Benefits of Participating:

  • Learn about private equity
  • Understand the value of diverse teams
  • Learn to pitch an investment in a real-life context
  • Learn about KKR and the many roles it offers

For more information, please contact the PE Program at [email protected].

 

Past Winners

2026 Winners

2026 Winners

Itron

  • Alan Havelka MSCF '26
  • Sophie Maher MSCF `26
  • Peter Makey MSCF '26
  • Ananya Mathur MSCF '26
  • Grace Taylor MSCF '26

2026 Finalists

  • Verra Mobility I
    • Gabrielle Braga MBA `27, Timothy Marino MBA `27, Shiven Samant MBA x MS `27, Victoria Villalba MBA `27, Jacqueline Willits MBA `27

2024 Winners

2024 Winners

Double Verify

  • Derek Cohen `25
  • Tomi Davidson '25
  • Keertana Krishnan '25
  • Anushree Periasami '25
  • Girija Sharma `25

2024 Finalists

  • AAP
    • Grant Dalton `26, Nisha Nanda `26, Susanna Scarlatti `26, Joyce Tan `26, Vasilis Varsakopoulos `26
  • Replay
    • Zackary Coley `26, Derny Fleurima `26, Maria Garcia Aguilar `26, Solomon Rice `26, Kevin Tian `26
  • Qualys
    • Shriya Bhargava `25, Sophie Bullard `25, Jisu Ashley Kim `25, Akshay Murali `25, Kyle Thomas `26

2023 Winners

Mister Car Wash

  • Rachel Eichelberger '25
  • Ashutosh Gharde '25
  • Zarish Khan '25
  • Aleksandra Saunders '25
  • Samuel Tedesco `25

2023 Finalists

  • Crocs I
    • Shrey Agarwal '25, Rodrigo Gonzalez '25, Glenn Jo '25, Madelaine Rich '25, Tushit Thakkar '25
  • Stride
    • Karl Amarteifio '25, Fred Kim '25, Sho Miyawaki `25, Chenchen April Sun '25, Lauryn Williams '25
  • Crocs II
    • Artemis Han '25, Julia Hu '25, Sofia Misotaki '25, Jack Ran '25, Philip Saba `25

2022 Winners

Columbia Sportswear

  • Danielle Kanter '24
  • Federica Tosi '24
  • Paulo Mattos '24
  • Aaron Mbakwe '24
  • Runj Viring '24

2022 Finalists

  • Dropbox
    • Ian Arena '23, Matt Cowen '23, Ricardo De Serdio Domecq '23, Amanda Fritz '23, Ryan Kang '23
  • Torrid
    • Nikita Lavrentiev '23, Ashutosh Poddar '23, David Reinthal '23, Raquel Safdie '23, Adam Shelepak '23
  • Sprouts Farmers Market
    • Ella McAlister '24, Thomas Mclnerney '24, Arthur Siddharta '23, Chenzuo Suo '23, Xinqi (Isabelle) Zhu (Exch. `23)
 

2021 Winners

Ingles Market

  • Matias Carrillo '23
  • Can Celenlioglu '23
  • Andres Lucioni '23
  • Michael La Mendola '22
  • Veronica Urquijo Barreiros '23

2021 Finalists

 

  • e.l.f Cosmetics
    • Marina Machin Alvarez '22, Edoardo Frau '22, Francesco Lualdi '22, Saba Rawjani '22, Elise Hu '23
  • Sally Beauty
    • Ehsan Ehsani '22, Rio Lu '22, Clemens Herrmann '22, Neimy Escobar '22, Shiya Wen '22
  • Xperi
    • Hugo Yen '23, Javier Villen '23, Kristen Henkels '22, Annie Wang '23, Aakash Budhiraja '23

2020 Winners

 

1-800-FLOWERS

  • Anna Constantino '22
  • Armin Hadavi '22
  • Levente Merczel '22
  • Dana Ng '22
  • Melody Zhang '22
 

2020 Finalists

 

  • 2020 Finalists
    • NextGen Healthcare
      • Daniela Boechat '22, Lacie Pierre '22, Pedro Pinto Coelho Neto '22, Franklin Shieh '22, Aya Shimura '22
    • Sleep Number
      • Tushar Benyani '22, Athena Cao '22, Bridie Gahan '22, Ignacio Juelle '22, Andrea Sordia Zanella '22
    • ACI Worldwide
      • Andreas Helland '21, Asli Pelit '22, Anna Silvestri '21, Amortya Sinha '21, Xiaobin Xu '21

2019 Winners

 

Vitusa

  • Todd Adams '21
  • Gonzalo Alvarez de Toledo '21
  • Pritika Gupta '21
  • Amitaabh Sahai '21
  • Eric Shu '21

2019 Finalists

 

  • Qualys
    • Madina Akhmetova '21, Alex Cheung '21, Ignacio Goulu '21, Satsheel Redkar '21, Logan Vos '21
  • Itron
    • Hyungi Jang '21, Ayush Rustagi '21, Aaron Shaiman '20, Kasey Lin '20, Jay Ng '21
  • Central Garden & Pet Co
    • Manas Bajaj '21, Douglas Dutton '21, Nikita Garg '21, Gabriele Martegiani '21, Ameya Sapre '21

2018 Winners

 

Outfront Media

  • Catherine Clark '20
  • Stephen Dennis '20
  • Benjamin Seeto '20
  • Jasmine Wang '20

2018 Finalists

  • 2018 Finalists
    • Sprouts
      • Christopher Bass '20, Alexander Chouraqui '20, Akshay Golechha '20, Julie Joseph '19, Izabel Kunstetter Frauche '20
    • Williams Sonoma
      • Alan Canarslan '19, Prateek Handa '20, Charlotte He '19, Eleanor Thadani '19, Ege Turkeri '19
    • H&R Block
      • Ivana Gjorgeva '19, Kathleen Jasnic '20, Johannes Moller '19, Khoa Nguyen '19, Harish Venkataperumal '19