Hi Typepad,
How are you?
I would like to share some good news with you. My group and I just acquired a division of JP Morgan called Primary Insight ? www.primaryinsight.com. Primary Insight is an expert network headed by two dynamic individuals who used to work for me at a previous company ? David DeRose and Leighton Thomas.
Clients of Primary Insight include leading mutual funds, hedge funds, private equity and venture capital funds. All these firms seek information that can help them find and execute good deals. An expert network such as Primary Insight connects them with key people who know from their work experience what is going on in each sector of the economy, both in the US and abroad.
We are always looking for new experts for our expanding network. Who is an expert? Individuals who have spent fifteen or more years in a particular field and have a deep understanding of that sector. Please consider signing up as an expert with us in your field of expertise.
Experts are compensated for their time and are called upon a few times a year to offer their views. If you would like to learn more about joining the Primary Insight network, please click on this site and also consider referring a friend to us who might like to be an expert.
Please check out http://www.primaryinsight.com/experts.htm
Be well,
Jack D. Hidary
Chairman
www.primaryinsight.com
(212) 365-6945
Here is the article in the WSJ and Dow Jones newswire: http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20090401-703999.html
APRIL 1, 2009, 6:00 A.M. ET
By Ed Welsch
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) has sold a majority stake in an independent research subsidiary it acquired from Bear Stearns & Co. to the units managers and a New York investment firm.
JPMorgan retains a minority stake in Primary Insight LLC, a small research firm that provides a form of alternative equity research called expert networking, essentially a matchmaking service for investment firms looking for advice from experts in various industries.
A source close to JPMorgan said it was a noncore business that never fit properly into JPMorgans research franchise.
Primary Insight executives Leighton Thomas and David DeRose, both formerly of Bear Stearns, arranged the buyout with a majority investment by The Hidary Group, an entrepreneurial investment firm whose founders created one of the early expert networking companies, Vista Research, which was sold to McGraw-Hill Cos. (MHP) in 2005.
The deal, which closed Tuesday, is a small one for JPMorgan. The terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Thomas and DeRose said the transaction was less than $100 million. Primary Insight employs 10 people and has 75 clients.
Several large Wall Street investment banks have entered partnerships with expert networking firms, which is becoming one of the more lucrative parts of the independent research business. Bear Stearns was the trendsetter in this area, and the only one of its peers to own an expert networking firm outright.
"Bear Stearns was the clearing agent for Gerson Lehrman, and they saw that Gerson Lehrman was doing $240 million," Thomas said, referring to the oldest and largest of the expert networking firms. "They saw there was a shift in research (spending) and it was going to the independent side, so they decided to get involved."
Bear Stearns brought on Thomas and DeRose, who were executives at Vista Research, to create Primary Insight at Bear in late 2005. After that, Goldman Sachs (GS), Morgan Stanley (MS) and Merrill Lynch all started their own partnerships with third-party expert network firms.
When JPMorgan acquired Bear in May of last year, it folded Primary Insight into the structure of its research department. But while Primary Insight was interested in expanding its business and hiring more people, the focus at JPMorgan, as at other Wall Street firms, was on cutting costs.
JPMorgan is keeping a strategic minority investment because it wants to maintain an interest in an alternative research platform. JPMorgan representatives didnt return calls seeking further comment.
Traditional Wall Street analysts have always had a Rolodex full of industry sources that they use to create their research reports; expert networking firms like Primary Insight essentially allow their clients to duplicate this process with a do-it-yourself solution - they provide the Rolodex and arrange the meetings for clients, and allow the clients to pick experts brains for themselves.
"Were essentially an extension of our clients Rolodexes," Thomas said. He said clients could ask his firm to find experts on nearly any topic, from "looking at a new medical device, to looking at Palm OS developers, to looking at a new oil rig in Papua New Guinea, to looking at carbon black in China."
Primary Insights clients generally pay $1,000 for up to an hour of time with experts, who receive up to several hundred dollars per hour depending upon their experience and qualifications.
