Steve Klinsky

Steve Klinsky founded New Mountain Capital in 2000 after working at Goldman Sachs and Forstmann Little & Company. New Mountain Capital developed a differentiated "defensive growth" approach to private equity, focusing on businesses in sectors that can grow even during economic downturns — primarily healthcare IT, software, education, and other industries with secular growth drivers that are less cyclical than typical industrial PE targets. The firm has managed multiple billions in capital and has been recognized for combining strong returns with lower cyclicality than many traditional PE strategies. Klinsky has also been active in education reform, founding and supporting various initiatives. The New Mountain approach involves intensive pre-investment research to identify businesses with durable competitive advantages, followed by operational value creation through professionalizing management, improving technology infrastructure, and supporting organic and acquisitive growth. This research-intensive "buy and build" model in defensive growth sectors became a widely emulated template in the PE industry.