Selling Your Business with David King

The private equity market has evolved and matured significantly in recent years, driven by several key factors that have reshaped the industry, including increased fundraising and capital deployment. In 2022 alone, global private equity fundraising reached approximately $1.2 trillion. This influx of capital has allowed firms to pursue larger deals and diversify their investment strategies. Mega-deals, particularly those exceeding $10 billion, have become more common, reflecting the growing financial power of PE firms. More recently, the fundraising and investment growth have slowed.

Private equity firms are increasingly utilizing initial public offerings (IPOs) and Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) as exit strategies. This trend reflects the strong performance of public markets and the desire to realize returns more quickly

Search funds and other new financial buyers have emerged as innovative participants in the M&A market, reflecting the evolving landscape of deal-making and investment strategies. A search fund is a pool of capital raised by entrepreneurs to acquire a small to medium-sized business. An entrepreneur typically does not have a specific target company in mind when raising the fund. They use the capital to search for a suitable business to buy, operate, and grow over time. Once a suitable acquisition target is identified, additional capital is raised to fund the purchase. The searcher often assumes a significant operational role in the acquired company, such as CEO. Search funds typically target small, profitable companies with stable cash flows and a potential for growth, often in niche industries. 

The ongoing Paramount $28 billion merger with Skydance Media was announced in mid-2024. Skydance, known for its strong portfolio of film and television productions, including the "Mission: Impossible" and "Transformers" franchises, is set to merge with Paramount to create a media powerhouse.

This transaction follows an intense period of negotiations and competition, notably with Edgar Bronfman Jr. dropping his bid for Paramount, which cleared the path for the Skydance deal to proceed. This competition extended the timeline as both Paramount and Skydance had to navigate these competing interests and reassess their strategies to ensure the merger would be successful. The merger is expected to provide both companies with enhanced content creation capabilities and greater leverage in negotiations with streaming platforms. 

The 45-day "free look" period in the Paramount-Skydance Media transaction was a significant aspect of the deal, providing both parties with a window of time to thoroughly assess the implications and potential risks of the merger and the flexibility to withdraw from the deal. 

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode we are joined by Andrea Steinbrenner to discuss the process of planning for a sale and executing the ideal sale for a business owner. 

Andrea is the CEO at Exit Consulting Group, which provides consulting and brokerage services for businesses and owners preparing for and executing a sale or similar change in ownership. She shares how he partners with business owners to define success, develop specific goals, and establish a plan of action to achieve them. An experienced executive who has worked across a multitude of industries, Andrea’s objective is to leave businesses better than she finds them and works to provide clients with their best possible outcome. Andrea’s win is seeing people succeed and helping them find the best way to reach their goals.

Andrea emphasizes the importance of clear communication by listening to the wants, needs, goals, and priorities of each client before collaborating. She works with staff to find solutions that best meet their goals and maintain the company’s culture and values. Andrea describes the structure of a company as a rainforest. The executives and senior staff are in the canopy and see the over-arching “big picture” while there may be organized chaos on the ground. 

Andrea worked her way up the managerial ladder in the retail industry. She earned a bachelor’s in accounting. She then worked for TGG Accounting, a mid-sized, outsourced accounting firm, and became a fractional CFO working in several industries, including construction, manufacturing, retail, professional services, financial services, cannabis, hospitality, franchises, and e-commerce sectors, among others. Deciding to take her career in a slightly different direction, after receiving an EMBA, Andrea started Canopy Consulting, a business consulting firm. She was referred to Exit Consulting Group (ECG) as a consultant in 2019, became COO in July 2020, and CEO in October 2022. 

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode, Tyson Ray and I discuss exit planning for business owners, marrying business owners’ sale with their other financial planning. Tyson is a founding partner of FORM and a financial advisor with over 25 years of experience guiding clients through life's events. 

Tyson is the author of Total Relationship, a book to help financial advisors fully understand their clients’ needs. Tyson shares client experiences, and describes the elements of the Total Relationship, being their Life Plan, Wealth Plan, and Care Plan. Tyson emphasizes the need for early planning, succession grooming, and acquiring life insurance at a young age.

Tyson received his Certification in Business Exit Planning to better support entrepreneurs and business owners in selling their business. He strives to help other business owners assess their future and business so they can monetize their life's work to enjoy a retirement they have worked hard to build.

Tyson has obtained his CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ Certification and his Certified Investment Management Analyst® Certification to apply knowledge with expertise to help make life better for his clients. He is passionate about having a complete with his clients and wants to help positively impact the financial industry.

Securities through Raymond James Financial Services, Inc. Member FINRA / SIPC. Investment advisory services are offered through Raymond James Financial Services Advisors Inc.  FORM Wealth Advisors is not a registered broker/dealer and is independent of Raymond James Financial Services. Raymond James and its advisors do not provide tax advice. Form Wealth Advisors is located at 431 Geneva National Ave S, Lake Geneva, WI 53147; 262-686-3005. 

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

Forever upholding the Sigma Chi Jordan Standard, Chris Pflueger graduated the University of Florida (Gamma Theta chapter) with a degree in Economics, then earned an MBA at USF in Finance and Management Information Systems.

With over 25 years of experience in sales leadership, sales management, and executive planning in franchising and related industries. Chris Pflueger is a Certified Franchise Executive and a proven leader: 

• Established a national expansion plan for We Insure and grew the franchise footprint into 33 states in 2 years with over 200 units.

• Produced 200% of goal within 1-year, exceeding industry growth rate and establishing RE/MAX as the global leader.

• Promoted 7 times in 9 years, advancing from Sr. Business Development Consultant to Vice President of 2 organizations within the RE/MAX umbrella.

• Created and rolled out a whole new brand, developing a marketing and sales plan and leading a successful market launch (over 100 units sold in the first two years).

• Exceeded franchise sales goals for 5 straight years (over 975 franchise units sold)

• Designed & rolled out a new web-based delivery platform in under $9M.

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode, we are joined by Bill Snow, author of Mergers & Acquisitions for Dummies and an experienced M&A professional with over 30 years of professional experience, including almost two decades as an investment banker. We talk about all aspects of mergers & acquisitions, how to properly plan for a deal and avoid the most-likely pitfalls, along with Pulp Fiction, poker, Milwaukee Cheesehead manufacturing, and the long-lost Chicago Bears. Bill's work includes business sales and capital raises for middle-market companies as well as buy-side services for acquirers seeking middle-market companies. Bill has written articles for online sources, as well as books about mergers & acquisitions, early-stage capital, and personal marketing. He has presented at universities including Northwestern University, DePaul University, IIT-Kent, and Harvard Business School, as well as the Thomson Reuters Midwestern M&A/Private Equity Forum, Chase Bank, Huntington Bank, Ice Miller, the Illinois CPA Society, and the University Club of Chicago. Bill is a Vistage speaker and has presented to groups in Chicago, New Orleans, Louisville, and Cincinnati. He has lectured internationally in Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates. Bill has an MBA and a BS in finance, both from DePaul University, and he’s a FINRA-registered Investment Banking Representative.

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode we are joined by Mac Lackey to discuss exit planning at every stage of the business life cycle. Mac is an American entrepreneur who has started, scaled and sold six companies (all seven or eight figure exits), most in health & wellness or internet commerce sectors.  Mac advises entrepreneurs through his Exit DNA program. Mac discusses the vision owners should adopt to build the strategic value of their business and see the acquisition through the buyer's perspective. Mac and his companies have been featured on CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Business North Carolina, USA Today and The New York Times. Notable ventures include: KYCK (acquired by NBC Sports), Mountain Khakis (acquired by Remington) and InternetSoccer Network (acquired by division of News Corp/Sky). He additionally served as a member of the Board of Directors for Lending Tree (NASDAQ: TREE) for over five years and is currently an angel investor in over 50 companies. Mac is the owner of the Spanish soccer team Algeciras Club de Futbol.

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode we are joined by Katie Wagner, founder of @KWSMTeam. Katie specializes in branding, messaging, and ongoing marketing execution with the goal of helping clients generate and convert more leads. Her services include content creation, social media management, web development, SEO, digital advertising, PR & influencer marketing. KWSM is a full-service digital marketing agency that specializes in lead generation. Most of their clients are looking to grow their businesses through developing predictable lead flow online. One area she frequently works is the M&A space. KWSM’s services can increase the value of a business by creating the digital infrastructure that provides consistent growth and removes the reliance on an owner or a rainmaker to head the sales and marketing activities. Ideally, KWSM is retained to increase digital marketing 18 months to three years in advance of the M&A event. As a former television journalist with 15 years of media experience and more than a decade of agency ownership, she has learned how to engage an audience, build credibility, and drive action. She loves helping business owners and CMOs integrate digital strategies into their marketing plans.

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

Kirk Michie of Candor Advisors provides his expert read on the current state of the M&A market in this uncertain economy with high inflation and interest rates and how it's all impacting mergers & acquisitions. Kirk has over 30 years of experience in mergers and acquisitions. He's worked in investment banking, private equity, and as an investment advisor. Today with Candor Advisors, he consults with owners and with businesses that are at the initial stages of exploring all their capital raising and M&A alternatives and sees them through their sale. He's been directly involved in 60 M&A transactions. Kirk provides reassurance, insight on how transactions and owners are being impacted by today's higher interest rates and Wall Street losses. In these uncertain days with evolving deal terms it's ever more important to "Talk to Kirk first."

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode we are joined by Andrew Van Dyke, a financial advisor with Modern Woodmen in Meridian Idaho. Andrew shares his wisdom from working with business owners to manage their financial assets, both within the business deferred compensation plans and outside the business with their own investments. Andrew was born in raised in beautiful Northern California, in wine country. From the time he was young, he had a passion for numbers and people. From the get-go, it has made this career a natural fit for him, but that's not why he works as a financial advisor. His biggest passion is time freedom, and his goal is to teach and pass on that passion to his clients. 

Andrew specializes in developing tax strategies for business owners and the self-employed to minimize their tax bills today and tomorrow. He helps to create passive income streams for business owners once they have transitioned out of their businesses.

Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.

In this episode we are joined by Nancy Rix, CPA, Partner at ATLAS CPA’s and Advisors who specializes in accounting for mergers & acquisitions. Nancy discusses a variety of issues business owners need to know relating to M&A, tax, and accounting.

Nancy joined ATLAS in 2022 and has 40 years of diverse tax, audit, and consulting experience in a variety of industries including manufacturing, distribution, software and biotech.  She has served as the California Society of CPA’s State Accounting Principles and Auditing Standards Chairwoman and is a frequent lecturer and author for numerous technical accounting, auditing, and transaction related topics. She has over 25 years of experience assisting buyers and sellers facilitating transactions. 
 
Prior to ATLAS, Nancy spent most of her early career with Big Four accounting firms in an auditing and consulting capacity, the last five years with Ernst and Young, LLP and PriceWaterhouse Coopers, LLP, respectively, in their Chicago based specialty transaction services groups. There, she led world-wide buy-side and sell-side due diligence and consulting engagements in a variety of industries. She earned her MBA in Finance from the University of Chicago and her Bachelor’s in Accounting from the University of Denver.

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Selling a business is the American dream, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the reward for years of hard work. Successful entrepreneurs make countless sacrifices in hopes that they would someday reap the benefits of their labor and live a new life of vacations, recreation, and prosperity.

You only exit your business once, so you should feel confident passing this milestone. A successful business exit reflects the preparation done beforehand. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

The owner of a privately held company has several alternatives on how to exit their business. In the absence of an exit strategy, events will inexorably dictate the final exit plan. A costly involuntary exit may be caused by death, disability, divorce, disagreement, or distress.

Selling Your Business with David King will help you take control of the sale process and make it positive one.