James Hexter
Philip Van Horn Gerdine Professor In Global Business; Professor of The Practice, Strategy and Innovation at Boston University
Schools
- Boston University
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Biography
Boston University
James Hexter is a Global Executive, Investor, Board Member and Senior Advisor
with over 30 years of experience working across a range of industries, geographies
and functions. He has deep experience in consumer goods, consumer electronics,
retail, B2B and industrial products and services, financial services, real estate and
construction, He has worked extensively with companies and executive teams
across North America, Asia, Europe, South America and Australia on domestic and
global issues including strategy, operational performance and improvement,
organization design, sales and marketing, growth and M&A. Mr. Hexter spent over
20 years living in Asia including significant time in Beijing, Taiwan, Hong Kong
and Singapore and has spent the last seven years in the United States. He is fluent
in Mandarin Chinese.
Mr. Hexter is a Professor of the Practice and the Philip Van Horn Gerdine Professor
in Global Business at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business.
Mr. Hexter is currently a Partner with Paxion Capital Partners, a growth oriented,
entrepreneurial multifamily office with a range of investment activities, operations
and holdings. Mr. Hexter joined Paxion in 2017 and is involved in the Firm’s
investment activities, the strategy and operations of portfolio companies and
creating and building new businesses for the Firm.
From 2014 to 2017, Mr. Hexter was a Managing Partner at LCatterton, a leading
global consumer-focused private equity firm with over $15 billion in assets and
activities across five continents. Mr. Hexter built and led the Firm’s global
portfolio operations team. In this role he worked with companies across North and
South America, Asia Europe and Australia on domestic and international strategy,
operations and performance improvement, organization design and change, growth
and sales and marketing. Mr. Hexter also co-led the diligence efforts for many of
the Firm’s investments. He was a member of several of the Firm’s investment
committees and served on the boards of a number portfolio companies including
Peloton, Steiner Leisure, John Hardy and others.
Prior to joining LCatterton, Mr. Hexter was a Senior Partner with McKinsey & Co.
where he worked for over 20 years. Mr. Hexter joined McKinsey in 1990 in the
Firm’s Greater China office where he was based until 2012 and from 2012 to 2013
he was in the Firm’s Washington DC office. While at McKinsey, James held a
number of leadership roles.
Mr. Hexter co-led the Firm’s Global Operations Practice from 2005-2010, was
Chairman of the Beijing Office from 2007-2012 and Chaired the Finance
Committee of the Greater China Office from 2010-2012. His final leadership role
was to found and lead the Global Construction, Infrastructure and Real Estate
practice. Mr. Hexter was also a member of the Firm’s committee that evaluated
partner performance.
During his time at McKinsey, Mr. Hexter served numerous Multinational, Asian,
Chinese and North American companies across a wide range industries including
those in the consumer, retail, business-to-business, industrial and financial services
sectors on issues of strategy, operational effectiveness and operational
improvement, manufacturing performance, procurement and supply chain,
organization, globalization, sales and marketing, investments, M&A and other
important areas.
Mr. Hexter is the co-author of Operation China: From Strategy to Execution,
published by Harvard Business School Press in December, 2007. He has been
published in the McKinsey Quarterly, the Asian Wall Street Journal, and other
publications, and has been an invited speaker and panelist at such institutions as the
Asia Society, the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Chamber of
Commerce, the Young President’s Organization and other prestigious organizations.
He has been also been a guest lecturer at The Harvard Business School.
Mr. Hexter is a member of The Council on Foreign Relations and a Trustee and
Executive Committee Member of The American Ballet Theater. Additionally,
James is a member of the Brown University Annual Fund Leadership Council. He
was a past Vice Chair of the Brown University China Council and Asia Council,
was on the jury for the Paulson Prize for Cities of the Future and was a Board
Member of the National Committee on US China Relations. James is a graduate of
Brown University and of the Harvard Business School, where he was a Baker
Scholar and received the Thomas A. Wolfe and Henry Ford Awards.
Education
- Harvard Business School - MBA 1992 - 1994
- Brown University - Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), Mathematical Economics 1984 - 1988
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