Steve Pagliuca Makes It Official

Steve Pagliuca, a managing director with Bain Capital, today announced that he’s running for the Democratic Party nomination to succeed Ted Kennedy in the U.S. Senate.

We discussed his potential candidacy earlier this week, including how it would affect ongoing operations at Bain. We’ve since received a copy of a letter Bain sent to its limited partners, which says Pagliuca will take a leave of absence rather than tender his resignation. What follows is a copy of the letter:

Dear Bain Capital Private Equity Investors:

We are writing to inform you that Steve Pagliuca has announced his intention to seek the U.S. Senate seat which became vacant upon the recent death of Senator Edward Kennedy.

Steve will be running in the Massachusetts Democratic primary scheduled for December 8, 2009.  If he wins the nomination of his party, he will run in the general election scheduled for January 19, 2010.  As a result, Steve will be taking a leave of absence from Bain Capital, relinquishing all of his responsibilities at the firm and the portfolio companies.

We want to assure you that Steve’s decision will not affect the operation of our business for several reasons:

– Our leadership team of 36 private equity Managing Directors is broad, deep and global.  We work in large, well-integrated teams across nine offices on both new investments and existing portfolio companies.

– Bain Capital is managed as a true partnership by consensus and the existing governance structure of the firm will remain intact.

– None of the firm’s resources will be used to advance Steve’s campaign.

As a firm with a tradition of service and charitable commitment, we are pleased that one of our partners would like to dedicate a portion of his career to public service.  We are also proud that Bain Capital is viewed as a potential source for our nation’s leadership, and we wish Steve well in his campaign.

We will keep you informed as the situation develops.

Sincerely yours,

The Managing Directors of Bain Capital Partners