Eric Beckman JD

Eric Beckman JD General Information

Biography

Mr. Eric Beckman serves as Managing Partner & Chairman of the Investment Committee at Breakwater Management. He brings 20 years of experience in private company investing. He began his finance career in the Investment Banking Division of Goldman Sachs, where he underwrote senior bank debt and high-yield bonds in leveraged transactions and assisted in the creation and management of the West Street Bridge Loan Fund. From 1998 until 2014 he was a senior investment professional at Ares Management. Eric joined Ares as a Principal, focusing on mezzanine, special situations, and private equity, and was a Senior Partner of Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund I, Ares' first private equity fund. He subsequently served as a Senior Partner and West Coast Group Head of the Ares direct lending group, where he built the West Coast origination and execution effort and managed the Venture Lending and Project Finance efforts. Eric was an Executive Vice President at Ares Capital Corporation (NASDAQ: ARCC), was the Co-Portfolio Manager of Ares Mezzanine Partners, and a member of the investment committees of Ares Corporate Opportunities Fund I, Ares Capital Management (investment advisor of ARCC), Ivy Hill Asset Management (the CLO management subsidiary of Ares Capital), Ares Mezzanine Partners and Partnership Capital Growth. Earlier in his career, he worked in the Office of the Mayor and for the City Council of New York. Eric has invested successfully through economic cycles in the equity and debt of private companies across several industries and brings particular expertise in transaction structuring, debt financing, and portfolio management. He has led investments and/or served on the Boards of Directors of many consumer/retail and media companies, including Samsonite Corporation, House of Blues Entertainment, Border Foods, Orion Food Systems, The Teaching Company, and The Alaska Clubs. He is also a member of the National Board of Directors of the Posse Foundation and chairs its Los Angeles Advisory Committee. Eric graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Political Theory and Economics from Cornell University where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He received his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was a senior editor of the Yale Law Journal. He also serves as Los Angeles Advisory Board Member at The Posse Foundation.