More than a dozen investment banks rejected Jason Scheir before Rothschild & Co took a chance on the college boxer. He later joined Apollo Global Management Inc. (APO) in 2008, six months before the global financial crisis, and went on to help build several of the firm’s investment businesses, including its hybrid value strategy.

Apollo established a dedicated hybrid strategy around 2017 to pursue opportunities that fall between traditional credit and buyouts. The business has since grown from slightly more than 20 investment professionals to nearly 100, with close to $100 billion in assets under management.

On the latest Behind the Buyouts, Scheir described hybrid as a risk-return framework that targets equitylike returns with creditlike downside protection. Apollo uses the strategy to provide public companies, sponsors and founder-owned businesses with capital tailored to objectives such as deleveraging, M&A and shareholder liquidity.

Recent examples included a transaction of more than $7 billion involving Keurig Dr Pepper Inc. (KDP) and more than $3 billion of preferred and common equity alongside Thoreau Group for its acquisition of healthcare revenue cycle management provider Ensemble Health Partners Inc.

Scheir said hybrid capital has increasingly become a primary financing option as companies confront higher rates, constrained exit markets and substantial capital needs in artificial intelligence infrastructure, energy transition, and aerospace and defense.

Listen to the full episode with Jason Scheir below:

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