TORONTO and CAMBRIDGE Mass., Sept. 27, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Institutional Limited Partners Association (ILPA) today announced its support of an initiative being undertaken by the Private Capital Research Institute (PCRI) to advance the understanding of private capital in the global economy.

The PCRI is a not-for-profit corporation led by Harvard Business School Professor Josh Lerner and funded by the Kauffman Foundation.  PCRI's primary goal is to produce high quality academic research on the private capital industry based in large part on the comprehensive, centralized academic databases of private capital activity that is being built by the PCRI.  The PCRI, in collaboration with The Brookings Institute, will analyze and disseminate its research findings to industry experts, policy makers and the public at large.  

"We applaud the PCRI's goal to create a better understanding of the private capital industry through unbiased academic studies.  The efforts of Josh Lerner and his team align strategically with the ILPA's priority to support global research initiatives that will serve to enhance the long-term sustainability of the asset class over the long term," said Kathy Jeramaz-Larson, Executive Director of ILPA.  "By encouraging industry thought-leaders to support this initiative, and by aggregating global data, we anticipate that the knowledge gap around private equity will diminish."

Professor Lerner commented: "Currently, the main barrier to performing high quality academic research on the private capital industry is the quality of information relating to transactions and funds.  Discrepancies across databases make it challenging to produce verifiable research and many researchers have difficulty accessing these databases.  Once the PCRI database is constructed, it will be made available to academic researchers in an aggregated form under strictly controlled circumstances and with tight security."

The PCRI will store the data behind a secure firewall at an academic institution.  The databases will not be publicly available.  Academics will need to submit proposals and get approval prior to gaining access to the data.  Researchers will only be able to analyze the data using software available on site and only permitted to download empirical results.

"We have already gained the support of three major data providers, as well as a number of general partners," Professor Lerner noted.  "We welcome the support of ILPA as this information can only serve to help institutional investors and their constituents."

About the ILPA:
The Institutional Limited Partners Association is the global member-driven organization dedicated to advancing the interests of private equity Limited Partners through industry-leading education programs, independent research, best practices, networking opportunities and global collaborations. ILPA has over 255 institutional member organizations that collectively manage over $1 trillion of private equity assets.

About the PCRI:  
The PCRI is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) corporation formed to sponsor leading academics and experts to share, collaborate, and disseminate research on private capital.  For more information about the PCRI, please contact Josh Lerner at jlerner@hbs.edu or Leslie Jeng at leslie.jeng@gmail.com.

CONTACT: Marc Raybin, Broadgate Consultants, +1-212-232-2222

SOURCE Institutional Limited Partners Association (ILPA)

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