Gerry Schwartz was born in Winnipeg in 1941 (Photo: Peter Redman/National Post files)

Gerry Schwartz was born in Winnipeg in 1941 (Photo: Peter Redman/National Post files)

BusinessWeek has a short piece out profiling Gerry Schwartz who left Bear Sterns a few months after Jerome Kohlberg, Henry Kravis and George Roberts in 1976 (founders of private equity giant KKR).

Schwartz, a Canadian, brought the same LBO platform home to Canada and founded Onex which has returned over 28% annually over the past 30 years (which beats KKR's 26% annualized return over the same period).

Schwartz took home $85 million in compensation last year roughly the same as Kravis and Roberts, combined.

Despite its track record and the fact that Onex has made $6 of equity investments in the U.S. for every $1 in Canada, Schwartz says he feels his company doesn’t get the respect it deserves south of the border. “We think we’re a North American firm with operations in the United States,” he says. “They think we’re a Canadian firm.”

Read: A Private Equity Pioneer Thrives in the Shadows