PE/VC Investing Insights from Family Office Backed Fund-of-Fund

Interview Snapshot

Rohit Yadav: Joel, thanks for joining. Let’s start at the top—can you tell us what Top Tier Access is and what strategies you’re investing in right now?
Joel Sandhu: Sure. The genesis of Top Tier Access came from recognizing a mismatch in how family offices were allocating to private markets. There was clearly a huge appetite, but we felt the current solutions weren’t always optimized for families—especially from a fiscal, fee, and portfolio creation perspective. So we basically stripped out the things we didn’t like and built something that worked better.

"We saw a mismatch between how family offices were allocating to private markets and the solutions available to them…. We took a look at the industry and stripped away everything we didn’t like—fiscally, fee-wise, and portfolio-wise—and built something that worked better"

Rohit Yadav: You mentioned earlier that you moved away from venture capital into buyouts. What was behind that shift?
Joel Sandhu: Just to be clear, we didn’t start as a pure VC house. We were always doing buyouts, but early on we also allocated to a few VC managers. Access to top-tier VC was hard to sustain year after year, and we were more confident we could build a world-class buyout portfolio consistently. Commercially, there was a stronger, more unified appetite for buyouts too.

From an investment lens, buyouts offer better replicability and risk-return. Most venture managers don’t go above 2x net, and the loss ratio is high. Buyouts, especially with top managers, offer strong upside and lower downside. We're not betting on market creation—we're allocating to stable, often boring businesses that provide solid exposure.

"The access to the very top venture managers is very difficult to do consistently year after year…. Buyouts allow us to build a programmatic approach—five managers per year, new fund every two years…. Our goal is to create buyout allocation like wine vintages—diversified and consistent."

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Rohit Yadav: So from the family office side, are they coming to you saying, “We want buyout exposure,” or is it more general conversations around returns and risk?
Joel Sandhu: It really depends on the sophistication of the family office. Some know the asset class well, others are still learning. A typical cycle we've seen with many family offices is they start with direct venture investments, then realize it's hard to make money unless you're specialized. So then they pivot to large-cap buyout names like Blackstone or KKR for stability.

Eventually, they discover those mega-cap funds don’t really knock the lights out on returns either. Now, everyone’s obsessed with the mid-market. But to access those managers—who often close funds in one go—you need someone like us. So we’ve seen this pendulum: from inefficient venture to inefficient buyout to now a growing awareness around mid-market efficiency.

"Most families see venture as an ecosystem builder or passion project—like backing local startups… From a commercial perspective, there's a more unified appetite for buyout FoFs than venture FoFs…. Family office understanding varies—some are very specific, others come in just asking for good returns."

Rohit Yadav: That’s a great framing. Strategically, how do you choose where to play within private equity—by geography, sector, or fund type?

Joel Sandhu: We start with building resilient portfolios. Typically, our split is 50-50 U.S.-Europe—though for some Middle Eastern clients it's 70-30 U.S.-Europe. That reflects the depth of ecosystems and exit potential. We avoid Asia for now—not because it's unpromising, but because performance is more proven in Europe and the U.S.

We diversify across types and sizes of companies and sectors. It's easy to fill a portfolio with just SaaS or tech funds, but then you risk being overexposed at the top of a pricing cycle. So we’ll do around 30-35% tech, 15-25% healthcare, and add industrials, business services, and a bit of consumer. But pure consumer plays tend to be cyclical, so we tread carefully.

Diversification also means types of companies. A software company with €10M EBITDA can look totally different depending on whether it’s growing at 35% or has a shareholder dispute. So we seek a mix: complex situations like take-privates or successions, good-to-great companies needing digitalization, and market leaders with high pricing and growth.

Rohit Yadav: What do LPs expect when they come to you? Are they focused on returns, capital preservation, co-investments?
Joel Sandhu: For Europeans, the first question is always about taxes—it has a huge impact on net returns. Beyond that, LPs want to outperform public markets. Some say, “If I can get 11-12% in PE, why not stick to public markets?”

So in our underwriting, we use direct alpha and KSPME metrics. The baseline has to be to beat public indices. And while there's an assumption that buyouts won't lose money, people are getting smarter about needing top-performing managers. There’s also skepticism about the industry’s image—fees are high, headlines are often negative, and if you’re not in the top decile managers, you may underperform. That’s where we come in—to curate and structure access properly.

"We don’t take a bet on any one sector—we want a cross-section of where PE is active…. Diversification isn’t just number of funds—it’s about company types, sizes, and sectors…. LPs want private equity to beat public markets—otherwise why bother with the illiquidity?"

Rohit Yadav: Do LPs ever ask to invest only in a specific geography or size bucket within buyouts?
Joel Sandhu: Yes, increasingly. We’ve had people say they want just the US part of the portfolio. Bigger European families often want that diversification because their core wealth is in Europe. Some just want low-mid market exposure. But no one has said, “Just give us consumer” or something that specific. Sector-specific requests are rare.

"Co-investments aren’t part of our FoF—we view them as a separate strategy…. If I’m getting co-investment access when CalPERS and Mubadala are in the fund, I need to ask why…. We don't want to choose a manager just because they offer co-investments—it should be about performance."

Rohit Yadav: And what about co-investments—do they see Top Tier Access as a gateway to those?
Joel Sandhu: That’s a funny one. We don’t put co-investments in our FoF. Larger FoFs—50% or more—do, and co-investments can outperform because of fee arbitrage. But for us, as a subscale player, we ask: what’s the quality of this deal flow? If I’m in a fund with CalPERS, Mubadala, ADIA, etc.—who have 500 lawyers to write watertight side letters—I have to ask myself, why am I getting this? There’s an information asymmetry. Plus, we don’t want to choose a manager just because they give us co-investment rights.

In buyouts, upside is capped, and downside is unlimited. It skews the risk-reward if you’re doubling down through co-investments. Co-investments can work, and large programs like LGT and NB do it well, but for us, it’s a separate bucket.

Rohit Yadav: Finally, when you're evaluating a fund to invest in, what’s the single biggest thing you're looking for?
Joel Sandhu: In one word—replicability. Performance is the filter: 2x net for larger funds, 2.5x for smaller. But beyond performance, can they do it again? We want to see MOIC distributions that are evened out—not a couple of 20x deals and a lot of zeros. That tells you whether their process is repeatable. We look at human capital—are they operationally improving companies or just doing financial engineering? We speak to everyone—from interns to managing partners—to check if they all think the same way. If the stars of past performance have left, it’s not the same product anymore. The firm’s philosophy has to be bigger than one person. That’s what we mean by replicability—in every sense.

"Our key criterion when evaluating a fund is one word: replicability… We want to see a consistent MOIC distribution, not just a few 20x outliers…. If the people who generated past returns have left the firm, it’s not the same product anymore."

Rohit Yadav: Joel, thank you for such an insightful conversation. It’s been fascinating hearing how you think about private markets and structure exposure for family office LPs. Thanks for joining.
Joel Sandhu: Thank you, Rohit. Pleasure to be here.