BlackRock’s McNeely to join Carlyle to service high-level institutional clients

Doug McNeely, who helped BlackRock formulate its first private equity-like impact investing strategy, is leaving the firm later this year to take a role at Carlyle Group, sources told Buyouts.

The move is among several at BlackRock over the past few months, including a slate of private equity secondaries dealmakers who left to join Apollo Global Management.

Bloomberg reported on McNeely’s impending departure earlier.

McNeely joined BlackRock in 2012, prior to which he worked as president of Commonfund Securities, responsible for a sales force covering 1,500 clients, according to his biography on BlackRock’s website. Earlier, he worked at Goldman Sachs and DLJ in equities sales and trading, his bio said.

McNeely is expected to join Carlyle in September, where he will work as part of a group servicing the firm’s institutional clients, sources said, confirming the earlier Bloomberg report.

At BlackRock, McNeely led the strategic client coverage group, responsible for strategic relationships with institutional investors like public and corporate pension funds. He more recently co-founded the firm’s Impact Opportunities business, which raised more than $800 million for its debut multi-alternatives fund, the firm reported in May.

McNeely was not involved in daily management of the fund, a source told Buyouts. He sat on the investment committee for the strategy. BlackRock Impact Opportunities Fund is led by Pam Chan, CIO and global head of BlackRock’s alternative solutions group.

“Through this fund, we are harnessing the power of the BlackRock platform and the active partnership of our clients to identify strong investment opportunities that align with our clients’ and partners’ ethos,” McNeely said in a statement about the fund.

Earlier this year, three senior executives on BlackRock’s secondaries platform, Steve Lessar, Konnin Tam and Veena Isaac, joined Apollo to lead its private equity secondaries strategy, Buyouts previously reported.

And Leo Chenette, a former managing director with BlackRock Private Equity Partners, left and joined New York State Common Retirement Fund as a senior investment officer focused on private equity.