Naresh KumarOperating Partner and MD at Operating Bridge PartnersSpeaker
Profile
Naresh is a globally recognised private equity practitioner and force multiplier accelerating portfolio value creation with over 20 years of experience in the Industry, private markets and Tier-1 consulting. He is based in London and operates globally, covering companies in Europe, North America, Asia, and the Middle East.
Naresh closely partners with institutional investors to originate deals, identify, diligence, plan, accelerate, realise, and protect value across the investment lifecycle. His recent roles range from expert advisor and interim management to full-scope portfolio operations.
As a player-coach, Naresh has supported multiple private equity and sovereign wealth funds in setting up, recruiting, scaling, running and improving in-house capability to optimise portfolio-wide costs including 3rd party spend. Since 2022, he has also been double-hatting as both operating partner and responsible interim executive in specific assets.
As an award-winning player-coach, Naresh is passionate about building, running and developing high-performing teams. Combining operator instincts with advisory expertise, he effectively governs, supports, and coach stakeholders to design an ambitious equity story, develop actionable plan and deliver target value.
Since 2016, Naresh has held senior operational and P&L owner roles in both private equity-backed and listed companies to expand margins, restructure operations, scale growth, drive returns on digital investments and realize value from buy-and-build platforms and carve-out deals. During the last 5 years, He has also served in multiple C-suite positions leading procurement, supply chain, operations and transformation functions.
Post-MBA in the US, Naresh built his private equity career as 'operating bridge' between alpha-seeking American funds and their sponsored companies. His expertise spans large-scale transformation, operational and commercial excellence, operating model design, exit-readiness, Zero-led organization and budgeting, shared services and outsourcing.
An active thought leader within the business community, Naresh has published extensively and regularly speaks on best practices in alternative asset management, value creation, leadership, team effectiveness, performance improvement, and the evolving role of technology. His Opex-light and Capex-light approach is fast becoming mainstream as effective, efficient and AI-led operations take centre stage in the investment committees and boardrooms.
Before portfolio career, Naresh held senior roles with Alvarez & Marsal, Accenture, Deloitte and Atkins. He holds an MBA from Purdue University and a Bachelor's from the National Institute of Technology (Jaipur).