Key Players Leave Buyout Firm J.W. Childs

Five senior members reportedly have resigned from Boston-based buyout firm J.W. Childs Associates and plan to start their own firm.

The firm's three remaining principals resigned last week, TheDeal.com reports, citing unnamed sources. The three, James Rhee, Jeffrey Teschke and Mark Tricolli, are expected to join a new private equity firm led by former J.W. Childs senior partners Dana Schmaltz and Ted Yun, who both resigned two months ago. The five men had worked as a team for the past seven years, the article says.

Sources told TheDeal that the three latest departures were "on the cusp of being promoted" from principal to partner. At J.W. Childs, they put together midsized deals for consumer products, specialty retail, healthcare and manufacturing companies.

Co-founders John Childs and Adam Suttin remain in the firm's Boston office, while the third co-founder, Glenn Hopkins, represents J.W. Childs in Asia, the article says.

Since its founding in 1995, J.W. Childs has invested in companies with a total transaction value of over $10 billion, the firm says on its Web site. Its last new fund, the $1.75 billion J.W. Childs Equity Partners III LP, launched in 2002.