Butterfly Private Equity Partners LLC, a food-focused private equity firm based in Beverly Hills, has two new executives.

The firm brought in former KKR Inc. managing director Vishal Patel as partner late last month, and most recently promoted managing director of its investment team and fellow KKR alum Peter Tang to chief financial officer. 

Butterfly was launched by former KKR principal Adam Waglay, who in 2016 left the giant firm’s consumer vertical to form a boutique firm servicing the food sector exclusively, bringing over Tang in the process.

Since then, Butterfly has invested across eight platforms and raised more than $1.5 billion in two funds. The company had its first exit last year, selling a majority stake of the protein powder brand Orgain to Nestlé S.A. for an undisclosed amount. 

According to Tang, Butterfly has invested a significant portion of its $1 billion second fund raised last year, deploying capital quickly and significantly adding to its asset pool. Tang says the firm will come back to the investor market once its fund is close to being fully deployed but may diversify allocation strategies as a more established firm.

“We’ve been in business for almost eight years and have a reputation and have a set of very strong relationships in the industry,” Tang said. “Over time we will be thinking about adjacent strategies to accelerate this growth curve.”

As its portfolio expands Tang said the firm is looking to hire additional employees. Its investments run the gamut of the food industry, infusing capital from farm production to grocery-shelf space. The firm buys into the health-and-wellness and premiumization trends capturing consumer attention, including the Pico Robertson-based MRO MaryRuth LLC, known as the MaryRuth Organics vitamin brand, and the fast casual franchise Qdoba Restaurant Corp. 

As the company continues to add talent, Tang believes Butterfly will keep its roots in Los Angeles, but sees the possibility to expand office presence into other cities.