Goldman Sachs Oil Banker Montgomery Said to Leave for Private-Equity Job

Senior Goldman Sachs Group Inc. banker to the oil and gas industry William Montgomery. Photographer: Carlos Javier Sanchez/Bloomberg

William Montgomery, a senior Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) banker to the oil and gas industry, is leaving the firm’s Houston office and plans to join a local private- equity firm, said a person with knowledge of his plans.

Montgomery, 49, may join Quantum Energy Partners later this year, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity. His retirement is effective May 31, Goldman Sachs said in a memorandum last month that was confirmed by Andrea Rachman, a Goldman Sachs spokeswoman.

Montgomery was part of Goldman Sachs teams that advised Schlumberger Ltd. (SLB), the largest oilfield services company, on its $11 billion acquisition of Smith International Inc. last year, and counseled Apache Corp. (APA) on its $7 billion purchase of assets from BP Plc (BP/) in the wake of the London-based oil company’s Gulf of Mexico spill.

After joining Goldman Sachs from Merrill Lynch & Co. in 2000, Montgomery became a partner in 2002, the memo said. He headed the natural resources investment banking group in the Americas from 2003 to 2007. Outside of his banking work, he is a former chairman of the board of trustees of the Houston Museum of Natural Science and of the St. Francis Episcopal Day School.

Quantum, founded in Houston in 1998 by a group including Wil VanLoh Jr., manages $5.7 billion of investments in the energy industry, according to its website. It raised its fifth, $2.5 billion fund in 2009.

Beverly Jernigan, a spokeswoman for Quantum, had no immediate comment.

London to Houston

A Goldman Sachs banker in London, Suhail Sikhtian, will move to Houston and become co-chief operating officer of the global natural resources group along with Stephan Feldgoise, Goldman Sachs said in a separate memo last month. Steve Daniel remains head of the Houston office, and is co-head of energy globally along with Alastair Maxwell, the memo said.

Goldman Sachs worked on $63.8 billion of mergers and acquisitions in the oil and gas industry over the past 12 months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, for a market share second only to Barclays Plc’s Barclays Capital unit.

To contact the reporter on this story: Zachary R. Mider in New York at zmider1@bloomberg.net;

(Blomberg)