Boyu Capital was founded in 2010 by Alvin Jiang, the grandson of former
general secretary of the
Chinese Communist Party Jiang Zemin, when he was 24 years old. In 2011,
Mary Ma, the former
chief financial officer at
Lenovo, left her role at
TPG Inc. to join Boyu. She was joined by Louis Cheung, a former executive director at
Ping An Insurance credited with its turnaround in 2000, and Sean Tong, a private equity veteran who had worked at
Providence Equity and
General Atlantic.
Li Ka-shing was one of the earliest investors, and through the
Li Ka Shing Foundation, helped Boyu raise $1 billion for its first fund. Other investors include
GIC,
Temasek Holdings and the
New York State Common Retirement Fund. Between 2011 and 2021, Boyu raised five US dollar funds with its fifth one raising $6.8 billion in 2021. At the time, it was the largest US dollar fund in China controlled by an independent manager according to AVCJ. During the same period, Boyu also raised three RMB funds and was raising a fourth one. It is believed Boyu was able to be involved in numerous high-profile deals due to Jiang's family connections. However, there hasn't been any direct evidence that his grandfather himself had a role in helping Boyu win any notable deals. In recent years, Boyu was adversely affected by changes of the market environment in China due to policies such as
common prosperity and the
2020–2021 Xi Jinping Administration reform spree in China. In 2021, it was reported that Tong and Cheung had relocated to Singapore to run the office there. The transition of operations to Singapore which began in late 2019 is said to be partially political as efforts were made by Chinese leader
Xi Jinping to curb the influence over retired Communist Party elders as well as tighten control over Hong Kong using the
Hong Kong national security law due to the
2019–2020 Hong Kong protests. Singapore offered Boyu greater distance from potential adverse actions by authorities in Beijing. In addition, part of Boyu's Hong Kong operations were transferred to Shanghai which is where Jiang is based. == Notable deals ==