"Institutional investors want to share the sick children in their portfolio with someone who can help make them better," said Bruce H. Goldfarb, chief executive of Okapi Partners, a proxy solicitation firm. In certain circles, T. Rowe Price, an institutional investor with $614 billion in assets under management, has gained a reputation for pursuing hedge funds and encouraging them to take up an activist campaign. The firm denies it suggests certain targets for activists but acknowledges it is in regular dialogue with other investors about the companies in its portfolio. At other big firms like BlackRock, which manages $4.3 trillion, the lines are more blurred. BlackRock denies that any of its portfolio managers pursue hedge funds with ideas, but some portfolio managers are said to pass on certain ideas.