Former CIO of $35 Billion AUM Public Pension Plan, Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS), Tom Tull Joins Star Mountain Capital as a Senior Advisor

Star Mountain Capital, a private, independent, employee-owned investment manager with ~$2.5 billion AUM announced that Tom Tull, former Chief Investment Officer of ~$35 Billion AUM Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS), has joined as a Senior Advisor.

NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Star Mountain Capital, LLC (“Star Mountain”), a specialized investment manager, with approximately $2.5 billion in assets under management, focused exclusively on investing in established, private small and medium-sized North American businesses (lower middle-market), is pleased to announce that Tom Tull has joined as a Senior Advisor. Star Mountain Senior Advisors / Operating Partners are aligned with Star Mountain’s full-time team and investors through sharing in carried interest and personal capital invested.

“We are delighted to have another veteran senior executive with over 40 years of investment management, portfolio allocation, and manager selection experience broadening our value-add capabilities in helping grow established smaller businesses across the U.S.,” said Brett Hickey, Star Mountain Capital Founder & CEO. “Tom has deep and distinguished investment experience and insights which we believe will further add value to our team, our investors and the portfolio companies we invest in.”

“I have had the privilege of knowing Tom for over 10 years so it is wonderful to be working with him now at Star Mountain,” said John Ide, Star Mountain Capital Managing Director.

“Star Mountain has built a distinctive business to address the challenges and opportunities of the lower middle-market, a less competitive market segment that has the potential to generate compelling absolute and risk-adjusted returns,” said Tom Tull, “I am delighted to be joining this high-quality firm that over the prior decade has built an experienced team nationwide with infrastructure to execute within this attractive but labor intensive and fragmented marketplace.”

Mr. Tull was most recently the Chief Investment Officer at the Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS) where he managed a ~$35 billion public pension plan that administers on behalf of employees and retirees of State of Texas employees. While at ERS, Mr. Tull was involved with over 200 completed investment transactions totaling $13 billion encompassing private equity, private credit, private real estate, global credit, hedge funds and special situations. He served in this capacity since 2009 and was responsible for all aspects of public and private markets investments including managing a team of approximately 80 staff members.

A sought-after speaker at investment industry events, Mr. Tull’s industry accolades include the CIO Industry Innovation award, Institutional Investor Public Funds CIO of the Year and AIF Institute Statewide Accredited Program Excellence award.

Prior to joining ERS, Mr. Tull was the Founding Partner of Gulfstream Global Investors, an international equity management firm sold in 2001 to German state-backed financial institution WestLB.

Previously, Mr. Tull was a Director – Employee Benefit Fund Investments for The LTV Corporation and also served as President of Western Reserve Capital Management, Inc., the pension asset management subsidiary of The LTV Corporation. In this capacity, he was responsible for the investment of a $1.2 billion retirement trust.

Prior to joining LTV in February 1983, Mr. Tull served for seven years as Director – Pension Investments of The Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Company. He managed an in-house pension fund, introduced international investing and other diversification policies and performed a variety of corporate duties including corporate acquisitions.

During his career, Mr. Tull also served a three-year term as a member of the National Adjudicatory Council of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). FINRA is the largest independent regulator of securities firms doing business in the United States.

Mr. Tull, a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) charterholder, received a B.S. in Finance from The Ohio State University and an M.B.A. from Xavier University. Following his military service in both Korea and Vietnam with the U.S. Army, Mr. Tull’s investment career began in 1971.

Since 2010 through 2021, Star Mountain has made over 135 direct investments in U.S. small and medium-sized businesses and over 25 secondary / fund investments within its Collaborative Ecosystem®, exclusively focused on the North American lower middle-market. One of Star Mountain’s specialties is seeking current cash income and yield for investors that is materially above the typical yields found in the public markets through its distinctive origination, underwriting and value-added lending capabilities.

For the third straight year, Star Mountain was again named one of the 2021 Best Places to Work by Crain’s New York Business as well as once again one of the 2021 Best Places to Work by Pensions & Investments.

ABOUT STAR MOUNTAIN

With ~$2.5 billion in assets under management (as of December 31, 2021), Star Mountain takes a data-driven approach to investing into the North American lower middle-market through two complementary investment strategies: (i) direct debt and equity investing and (ii) secondaries (acquiring LP interests and direct assets). Star Mountain believes these complementary strategies provide scalable and diversified access for its institutional and high-net-worth investors to established small and medium-sized businesses that generally have at least $15 million in annual revenues. Star Mountain’s 100% employee-owned team and Collaborative Ecosystem ® provides distinctive value to lower middle-market businesses as a flexible capital solution partner.

Star Mountain believes its focus and dedication has been productive for job creation and economic development. Star Mountain is dedicated to this large market of underserved businesses purpose-built to address the challenges and opportunities of these companies. As part of its commitment, Star Mountain has trademarked Investing in the Growth Engine of America ®.

As part of its ESG program (Environmental, Social and Governance), Star Mountain’s Charitable Foundation, a not-for-profit 501(c)3 focuses on improving lives through economic development, including job creation, health & wellness and cancer research. Notable missions include helping match veterans and women with high quality small and medium-sized business career opportunities across the country, including within Star Mountain’s portfolio.

Note: This does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to purchase interests in any investment product. Awards and recognitions by unaffiliated rating services, companies and/or publications should not be construed by a client or prospective client as a guarantee that he / she / it will experience a certain level of results if Star Mountain is engaged, or continues to be engaged, to provide investment advisory services; nor should they be construed as a current or past endorsement, testimonial endorsement, recommendation or referral of Star Mountain or its representatives by any of its clients or any other third party. Rankings published by magazines and others are generally based exclusively on information prepared and / or submitted by the recognized advisor. Moreover, with regard to all performance information contained herein, directly or indirectly, if any, readers should note that past results are not indicative of future results. The description and the selection methodologies of each award and recognition are subjective and will vary.

Awards and recognitions by unaffiliated rating services, companies, and/or publications should not be construed by a client or prospective client as a guarantee that he/she/it will experience a certain level of results if SMFM is engaged, or continues to be engaged, to provide investment advisory services; nor should they be construed as a current or past endorsement, testimonial endorsement, recommendation or referral of SMFM or its representatives by any of its clients or any other third party. Rankings published by magazines and others are generally based exclusively on information prepared and/or submitted by the recognized advisor.

Crain’s two-part survey process consisted of evaluating each nominated company’s workplace policies, practices, philosophy, systems and demographics. The second part involved an employee survey to measure the employee experience. The combined scores determined the top companies and the final ranking. Star Mountain must pay a fee to Crain’s only for survey collection purposes. Detailed eligibility criteria can be found here: https://www.bestplacestoworknyc.com/eligibility-criteria

To be named to P&I‘s Best Places list, all firms met Best Companies’ high threshold for inclusion and were evaluated against others of similar size. Individual firm profiles, which were compiled based on survey results, reflect U.S. employment numbers and were confirmed by Best Companies in the summer. Company and employee comments were edited for space, style and clarity. Assets under management or advisement are as of June 30, unless otherwise noted. To participate, companies had to have at least 20 employees in the U.S., at least $100 million of discretionary assets under management or advisement and be in business for at least one year. An anonymous employee survey, which aimed to evaluate employee engagement and satisfaction, accounted for 75% of a firm’s score; an employer survey, which evaluated workplace policies, practices, benefits and demographics, made up 25%. https://www.bestplacestoworkmm.com/eligibility-criteria

Contacts

John Polis – [email protected]