Former Stanford University endowment chief John Powers has signed on to help Credit Suisse get back in the business of buying minority stakes in hedge fund firms.

Powers, who ran Stanford's $25 billion investment portfolio until May, joined the Swiss bank in July as co-head of a unit that intends to raise outside money for those stakes, the bank said Thursday. Credit Suisse started retreating from that business in 2012 when it wound down Asset Management Finance, which invested the bank's own money in hedge funds.