Our Services
Marketability Assessment
As you consider selling your business to an outside buyer, a Marketability Assessment gives you the clarity to move forward with confidence. This forward-looking analysis estimates what a qualified buyer would actually pay for your company today, drawing on your performance, prevailing EBITDA multiples, and comparable transactions to establish a tight range of values while pinpointing the drivers that enhance value and the detractors that may hold it back. It also illuminates the current M&A landscape, the timeline and steps involved in a sale, and the right partner to represent you, making it the essential first step toward maximizing the value of your exit.
Equity Recapitalization
A recapitalization lets you take some chips off the table by selling a portion of your business to a private equity group, typically a majority stake of 70 to 80 percent, while converting part of your ownership to cash today. It is often the right fit for owners who want to stay active in their companies, are comfortable working alongside a partner, and can tolerate the risk that the relationship may not go as planned. The benefits are meaningful: reduced personal risk through diversification and the transfer of personal guarantees, fresh capital to expand and pursue acquisitions, rewards for key managers, and the potential for a higher return on your remaining interest if the partnership succeeds.
Investment Banking
Mergers and acquisitions, commonly known as M&A, is the process of selling your business to an outside party, whether a strategic buyer seeking to expand or a financial buyer such as a private equity group looking to invest. For most owners, this path offers the greatest potential to maximize value and achieve immediate liquidity, unlocking the full worth you have built over years of hard work. The process involves positioning your company in the marketplace, identifying and negotiating with qualified buyers, and structuring a transaction that aligns with your financial and personal goals. With the right advisors guiding you through each stage, M&A can transform the sale of your business into the most rewarding financial event of your lifetime.
Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs)
An employee stock ownership plan, or ESOP, is a qualified retirement plan that allows you to sell your company to your employees on a tax-favored basis, and if you sell 30 percent or more, you can defer or even eliminate capital gains taxes when proceeds are rolled into qualifying securities. It offers powerful advantages: it creates a private market for your shares, provides diversification so your wealth is not tied up in one asset, rewards your employees with meaningful equity ownership, and can be especially attractive for S-Corps by generating tax-free cash to operate the business. Perhaps most appealing, an ESOP lets you retain substantial control and preserve your company's culture and philosophy, because unlike an outside buyer, an ESOP is a friendly buyer that also protects your valued employees from potential layoffs. That said, an ESOP involves up-front and ongoing valuation and administration costs, requires a sizable and capable employee base, and generally will not command the highest price, so if immediate liquidity at top dollar is your goal, another path may serve you better.
Management Buyout
A management buyout, or MBO, is the acquisition of your business by its senior management team, who participate as significant equity partners in the deal. Because management often lacks the capital to buy you out, you frequently become the bank, financing the sale through a note paid back over time with interest, though the deal can also be structured to place debt on the company or combined with an ESOP to broaden ownership. The advantages are compelling: your company's culture continues and strengthens as employees gain equity, you gain flexibility in price and deal structure, confidentiality is better maintained, and your personal guarantees are typically removed. The trade-offs are equally important to weigh, however, since management may lack the capital or credit to complete the sale, good employees do not always make good owners, and the tax burden on an internal buyout can be substantial.