Curriculum

Private equity electives, which build on the MBA Program’s solid core of courses, are much in demand.  There are elective offerings in credit markets, later stage buy outs, restructuring, and venture capital. Below is a sampling of courses that have been offered in the past, and current courses offered:

Emerging Markets Private Equity Investing:
Private Equity in Emerging Markets
This course is being taught for the first time in Fall 2009 by Dr. Roger S. Leeds.

This course is designed to provide students with a practical understanding of how private equity investments are originated, structured, valued, and eventually exited, focusing primarily on developing country environments. The underlying premise of the course is that private equity in developing country environments is a distinctly different asset class than in industrialized countries for a number of reasons that will be identified and analyzed by students, such as valuation techniques, corporate governance standards, contract enforcement, and exit alternatives. The course will be analytically rigorous and require a high level of weekly preparation and class participation. The case method of teaching will predominate, allowing students to gain a realistic understanding of the roles, responsibilities, and analytical skills required of various PE stakeholders, including PE fund managers, institutional investors in PE funds (LPs), owners of companies that are PE recipients, and government officials who formulate policies that influence PE investor behavior and performance. Cases will be based on actual transactions, highlighting the challenges and tasks performed at each stage of the PE investment cycle, such as structuring a new fund, originating investment opportunities, conducting due diligence and valuation, monitoring and creating value in portfolio companies, and exiting.

Dr. Roger S. Leeds is a Professor of International Finance at the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of the Johns Hopkins University, the Director of the School's Center for International Business and Public Policy. Dr. Leeds is also a member of the Council of Foreign Relations in New York, the Cosmos Club in Washington, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association (EMPEA). He received his undergraduate degree from Columbia University, and his MA and PhD from Johns Hopkins University.

Credit Markets:

Private Equity, the Credit Markets and Leveraged Buyouts
The course begins with a review of credit market conditions leading up to the credit crisis of 2007. By discussing high-profile leveraged buyouts, students become familiar with this financing technique. Also discussed is the outlook for the credit markets and for leveraged buyouts in 2008. The course familiarizes students with private equity and its partners in the leveraged-buyout process. By looking at specific transactions, the course also examines whole-company securitization, asset-based finance, commercial mortgage–backed securities, and PIK/Toggles as a means of facilitating leveraged buyouts.

Later Stage Buy Outs:

Private Equity: the asset class, its investments and its markets
This course explores private equity, which has become an important dimension of investors' portfolio allocations and a key driver of M&A and financing activity.  The course discusses the private equity markets, focusing on key strategies, economic drivers, fund structures, investors, and regulatory backdrop.  It also explores underlying approaches to private equity valuation and the sources of investment in buyouts.  Finally, current topics, including the global proliferation of private equity funds and firms, the interplay with other alternative investments and public market liquidity options, are discussed.

Master Class in Private Equity
The master class is an unique opportunity for students to dissect one company’s evolution from subsidiary of a Fortune 100 company to taken private to introduction into the public equity markets. During the semester, guest speakers from the company, from the many capital market players and from the investment banking and legal professions will come to class and bring the process to life, providing unique insights for the students and offering the class the opportunity to interact with the senior professionals responsible for stewarding a firm’s growth. For the final assignment, each student team will write a case about this company.

Restructuring:

Seminar in Distressed Value Investing
This course provides an introduction to distressed investing, including a comprehensive review of investing styles, markets, and company situations. The goal of the class is to provide students with broad-based exposure to what is one of the most complex and intellectually stimulating areas of the market.

Turnaround Management
This course provides students with a perspective on identifying and remedying turnaround business situations. Students learn, from the standpoint of a general manager, how to distinguish between “troubled” and “crisis” companies and how to use both qualitative and quantitative tools to effect solutions.

Venture Capital:

Venture Capital: Risks/Opportunity
This course focuses on the role of venture capital, and the venture capitalist, in identifying, selecting, funding and developing emerging companies. Students should expect to complete the course with a basic understanding of the processes, incentives, structures and activities employed by those making the risk-reward determinations to fund new and growing companies. In addition, the course touches upon the opportunities and hurdles surrounding the internationalization of venture capital.

Venture Capital Seminar
The course is designed to give students an overview of the venture capital industry and a detailed understanding of the workings of a venture capital partnership. Although the course emphasizes early-stage venture capital investing, all stages of investing, including leveraged buyouts, are discussed.



 


Other Electives of Interest

Innovate or Die

Enterprises must create and re-create themselves to establish and maintain competitive advantage. This course examines the people and processes behind innovation. Through a combination of cases, articles, and videos the course provides a historical foundation and geopolitical perspective on innovation, and then looks at the techniques and people, entrepreneurs, and corporate executives (successful and not so successful) whose ideas, creativity, passion, and perseverance have tried to move the world forward. This nonquantitative course focuses on the activities and challenges faced by entrepreneurs and corporations, in the United States and internationally, as they have struggled to create and implement their ideas. We will focus on examples from the worlds of information technology, consumer products/retailing, government, media, and the arts, while looking in detail at enterprises as diverse as Apple Inc., Segway, IKEA, Children’s Television Workshop (Sesame Street), Napster, and Cirque du Soleil and at entrepreneurs ranging from Ted Turner (CNN) and Hugh Hefner (Playboy) to Milton Hershey and Howard Schultz (Starbucks). Classes will feature a combination of company evaluation, lectures, videos, guest speakers, and group discussions. The course should prove useful to those interested in entrepreneurship, corporate strategy, venture capital, general management, and leadership.