In 2006, UBS Vice Chairman Blair Effron had dinner with his friend Robert Pruzan, a veteran investment banker and former CEO of Wasserstein Perella. The two men decided to capitalize on the lucrative M&A boom by going in to business together, opening a boutique they dubbed Centerview Partners—the name came from the view at their new office on the 19th floor of Rockefeller Center. The firm has since moved to larger offices in New York; it also has offices in London, Palo Alto, Paris and San Francisco. And today, that firm’s clients include 20 percent of the 50 largest companies in the world.

At Centerview, there are just two lines of business: M&A advisory and restructuring, with both businesses addressing strategic, financial, and operational issues for its clients.  (An affiliated capital group focuses on high potential, growth-focused technology companies, as well as the U.S. consumer middle and upper-middle market, most recently through the creation of two SPACs, both of which have been successfully invested.) Since Effron and Pruzan's vision was realized, Centerview has added several additional high-powered bankers and brought total headcount up to just over 450.