Investment Associate, Private Debt at British International Investment

Team and role overview

• The Private Debt team provides direct investment capital across Africa and South Asia in the form of senior loans, guarantees, mezzanine and structured financing. The team focuses in sectors that support significant productivity and employment creation such as healthcare, education, food and agribusiness, general manufacturing, telecoms, industrials, and real estate.

Purpose

• Reporting to the Head of Private Debt, the Investment Associate’s role is to contribute to the continuing expansion and development of the Private Debt direct investment business through origination, structuring, execution, and monitoring of debt investment opportunities that meet BII’s commercial and development impact criteria.

Responsibilities

There are 5 levels in the team – Associate, Executive, Manager, Director, and Team Head – and there are 3 key roles of the job (at all levels):

• Strategy and Origination –finding and evaluating investment opportunities, and building and maintaining relationships with companies and financing partners;
• Deal Structuring and Execution – analysing investment opportunities in detail, conducting due diligence, navigating the Investment Committee process, agreeing legal terms; and
• Portfolio Monitoring – engaging with borrowers to monitor performance and contribute in areas where we can help achieve better outcomes from a financial, development impact, E&S, or governance perspective.

At Investment Associate level, you will spend the majority of your time on Deal Structuring and Execution and Portfolio Monitoring, and responsibilities will include:

Deal Structuring and Execution:

• Producing financial models including cash flow analysis, debt sizing and sensitising for the purpose of assessing commercial viability of a transaction, determining optimal capital structure, and assisting in client negotiation.
• Completing discrete due diligence tasks such as company, industry, and economic analysis. Managing any external consultants engaged as part of the due diligence process.
• Liaising with potential borrowers by way of information gathering, questioning and deal negotiation.
• Identifying transaction risks and how these can be mitigated.
• Reviewing term sheets and legal documentation together with the internal legal team.
• Managing the engagement of support teams (Environmental, Social, Business Integrity and Development Impact), ensuring all internal stakeholders can achieve their objectives.
• Preparing detailed credit papers that capture all of the above for presentation and recommendation to investment committee.

Portfolio Monitoring:

• Reviewing company reports, monitoring compliance with covenants, flagging any potential credit issues, reviewing any waiver requests or amendments, preparing, and presenting monitoring papers for consideration by BII’s investment committee.
• Keeping up-to-date deal-flow, deal management and portfolio monitoring databases for transactions covered by the Private Debt team.

The candidate

Background, skills, aptitude

The successful candidate should demonstrate the following aptitudes:

• Results Focus: Drive to achieve objectives/results
• Personal Effectiveness: Organising self/teams to meet agreed deadlines
• Team Working: Collaboration with own team and the wider BII community
• Influencing/Persuading: Ability to obtain agreement and cooperation in a ‘win-win’ fashion
• Mission driven: Alignment with BII’s objectives including an interest in development and sustainability issues

Relevant experience might include working in financial markets or management consultancy, ideally with experience in investment banking, private debt or equity investing, and/or emerging markets’ finance.

Expected technical skills comprise of:

• Advanced knowledge of Excel and associated cash flow modelling skills;
• Strong financial and analytical skills to analyse company financial statements, forecasts, sector data, and macroeconomic context;
• Understanding of structuring of debt investments and associated challenges/issues;
• Ability to gather knowledge through due diligence and to form views based on that due diligence; and
• Solid written and oral presentation skills, including the ability to write reports and to present conclusions and ideas to an audience.