Affinity Equity Partners’ Korea head Sam Lee resigns

Affinity Equity Partners’ Seoul office head Sam Lee has left the global investment firm, sources familiar with the matter told The Korea Economic Daily on June 7. He submitted a resignation letter to the headquarters last week, sources said.

Lee’s resignation came as a surprise to the PE industry. The former Affinity partner had been touted as an important talent to lead the management, alongside founding member and Managing Partner Lee Chul-joo, after co-founder Park Young-taeg retired in March.

The reasons for Lee’s resignation and his next career rmove remain unknown, sources said.

Lee joined Affinity in 2007 and became the Seoul office head in 2018. Before joining the firm, he spent seven years with McKinsey & Co. where he focused on advising tech and finance companies across Asia, Europe and the US on corporate strategy and finance and post-merger management. Born in 1973, he holds a bachelor of science in chemical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

Industry insiders speculate he left Affinity as the firm’s investments in Korea have slowed in recent years.

Since its inception in 2002, the private equity firm has executed some major deals in the country. Jointly with US investment giant KKR & Co., it acquired Korea’s leading beer maker Oriental Brewery from Belgium-based Anheuser-Busch InBev SA (AB) for $1.8 billion in 2009 and sold it back to AB for $5.8 billion in 2014.

In 2005, Affinity bought about an 80% stake in Korea’s electronics retail chain operator Himart, which is Lotte Himart today, for 800 billion won ($613.7 million). The firm disinvested Himart stocks for 2 trillion won to Korean real estate developer Eugene Group in 2007.

Meanwhile, the PE firm has struggled to exit from minority equity in Kyobo Life Insurance Co. with ongoing legal battles since 2019. Kyobo Life has claimed that Affinity-led financial investors (FIs) had unfairly inflated its valuation to sell their shares back to the unlisted insurer for a higher price.

Affinity has also seen poor performances of its buyout portfolio companies including household products maker Lock & Lock, Burger King’s operation in Korea and customer support outsourcing company Ubase.

The PE manager created its fifth Asia buyout fund with $6 billion in 2018 and has invested in Korea’s top recruitment portal JobKorea and food delivery platform Yogiyo in 2021. Affinity’s performances in the Korean market haven't garnered much attention since then. 

Write to Jun-Ho Cha and Ji-Eun Ha at chacha@hankyung.com

Jihyun Kim edited this article.