Max DeZara
Founding Partner and CEO
Max DeZara is Akoya Capital’s founding partner and CEO. Akoya’s mission of bringing together industry-leading executives and platform companies and providing capital to create market-leading organizations has been Max’ career vision, shaped through his deep human capital management expertise. Max’ expertise lies in understanding a company’s business strategy and aligning it to human capital management strategy, resulting in organizations with unique competitive advantage and increased shareholder value.
Max has numerous trusted relationships in the investor community, including institutional investors, venture capital and high-net-worth investors. He plays a key consultative role in each Akoya Capital transaction, working closely with Akoya’s management partners, senior operating executives and co-sponsors.
Akoya Capital’s business model is a pivotal outcome of Max’ 25 years of experience in recruitment, assessment and human capital consulting. He has partnered with private investors, board directors and leading companies to build the leadership teams of world-class public and private organizations. Across Max’ career, he and his partners have identified and evaluated talent — aligning business strategy to human capital strategy — and built out dozens of leadership teams and operating companies. The teams he has developed and placed have created billions of dollars in shareholder value.
With this expertise, in 1982 Max founded Carlyle Group, now a leading Midwest boutique firm specializing in senior-level executive search and consulting. In 1998, Max sold Carlyle to The Whitney Group, creating a top-ten executive search firm with eight offices worldwide. During his affiliation with The Whitney Group, Max was elected vice chairman and served on Whitney’s board of directors. Max subsequently led a successful management buyout of the original Carlyle business in 2004 and today is chairman and majority shareholder of Carlyle Group.
Max is an active member of the National Association of Corporate Directors, the Association for Corporate Growth and the Executives’ Club of Chicago. Additionally, he serves as an active board member of several profit and not-for-profit organizations, and is a past president of the National Association of Executive Recruiters. Max is involved in the Angel Investors of Chicago and is an active philanthropist.