Work Is Personal, a Passion for Kapish Haldia
Kapish Haldia is a California-based investor, entrepreneur, and property developer.
Born and raised in Southern California, Kapish helped his Indian immigrant parents run a growing jewelry manufacturing and jewelry business near their home. As a youth, he spent much of his free time learning how to build and scale a successful enterprise. By high school, he had worked on virtually every aspect of the company, from developing and managing customer relationships, securing and expanding the supply chain, and ensuring the company maintained healthy cash flow as it expanded.
Kapish credits this period in his life with sparking his interest in entrepreneurship and laying the groundwork for the success he subsequently achieved in his own work. From his father, Govind, he learned the importance of strong customer relationships and effective internal and external communication. From his mother, he learned the importance of quality workmanship and putting family first, even in business.
Kapish Haldia left Los Angeles as a teenager to attend the Stern School of Business at New York University. There, he served as portfolio manager for the Stern Investment Analysis Group, a real-money student investment group that ultimately “employed” more than a dozen student investors. He was also president of the Inter-Club Council, responsible for overseeing all Stern student organizations’ leadership teams and budgets. Like his work on the family business, these endeavors helped lay the groundwork for his future career.
Kapish held several internships as a student. He worked for the CFO of DoSomething.org, a change-oriented nonprofit digital platform, and with a Blackrock investment team. His third internship, with Citigroup’s investment banking division, grew into his first post-graduation job with Citi’s Global Industrial Group. At Citi, Kapish worked under legendary investment bankers like Scott Baird, Ben DeFabio, and Kevin Cox, and was involved in several deals involving Fortune 100 firms like Crown Packaging, Ball Corp, General Electric, and Lockheed Martin.
Kapish left Citigroup in 2016 Kapish to join the founding team at Highview Capital, a middle-market private equity shop based in Los Angeles. Over the next six years, he had a hand in nearly 50 acquisitions and corporate turnarounds valued between $50 million and $500 million. He served on more than two dozen corporate boards during this time.
In 2022, Kapish left Highview to work on addressing what he saw as a pressing need in the private equity space: the lack of resources and support for small and midsize family-owned businesses (like his own family’s) in industries primed for consolidation. He aims to build a scalable investment platform that provides bespoke guidance for these firms, ultimately helping them maximize stakeholder value and achieve successful exits.
Kapish Haldia is also working to launch a new music and food venue in his adopted hometown of Venice in California. Blending his passion for community and culture, he and his team aim for a grand opening in 2024.
Kapish offices out of Neuehouse, a vibrant community of founders and builders. When he’s not working, he enjoys working on his meditation practice, taking long walks on the beach nearby, and reading foundational management and investing texts.