José María Vara
Partner
Searcher / CEO mentorship and investment due diligence
Search strategies, seller dynamics
Board Observer | Zeker en Mobiel (NL)
Fluent in Spanish, based in the UK
MBA | Stanford GSB
José María is a former Relay searcher who launched one of the first search funds in Europe in 2014, then led the company it acquired as CEO and later as Director through its exit.
His search fund acquired a Spanish transportation and logistics company in January 2016, where José María served as CEO from 2016 to 2017 and as Director until the company's exit in June 2023. Since 2015, he has advised search fund entrepreneurs and spoken at ETA courses in leading European business schools. At Relay, he supports searchers on cap table decisions, search team structure, preliminary analysis of opportunities, seller relationships, and board composition.
Before rejoining the Relay family to help launch the European fund, José María was a Product Director at Oliver Wyman in London, where in 2018 he helped launch and led the build of the Illiquid Assets Exchange digital platform, later leading its sale and technology transfer in 2021 and 2022. Earlier, he worked as a strategy consultant in Financial Services at Oliver Wyman and as an on-site pro-bono advisor for Strathmore University in Nairobi, Kenya.
In his spare time, José María enjoys spending time with his family, reading, hiking, and running (some might add "slowly"). He lives in London.
José María holds an MBA from Stanford GSB, where he first learned about search funds in 2011, and degrees in Law and Business Administration from ICADE in Madrid.
