Search Party

Artificial intelligence has reached the lower-middle-market, as seen in the case study of Haley, an AI agent deployed by Entrepreneur-Through-Acquisition (ETA) Tyrel Sulzer to win customers for his commercial driving school, TransTech. In a fascinating conversation with Search Party, TransTech co-CEO Sulzer and his investment partner, Dustin Sellers, Managing Partner of ETA private equity firm Next Coast Legacy, share details of Haley's rapid implementation, and how the AI agent has transformed the sales function of North Carolina-based TransTech.  In a recent week, Haley, programmed with a slight southern drawl and "aw shucks" charm, exchanged 16,000 text messages with potential customers, as well as 300 voice calls. Over that time, Haley's lead outreach enjoyed a staggering 66% response rate.  Most real people to have interacted with Haley, including Sellers, couldn't tell she was an AI agent. "It's working. . . it's not clunky," says Sellers.  Among the episode highlights: Having developed a reputation as a technology laggard, the lower-middle-market is now rapidly adopting AI-powered tools to transform business functions, including sales-qualification outreach. " If you're not using technology in the lower middle market, um, you're likely gonna get left behind," says Sellers, who estimates that platforms like Haley may add 100 to 200 basis points to a company's bottom line.  Sulzer set up Haley in a single afternoon after learning from a friend that the same technology had outperformed a human sales team.  As TransTech grows and scales, Haley is facilitating greater revenue-per-internal employee, and important metric of success. Haley has exhibited great ingenuity in responding to customer requests, but at one point had to be programmed to not surreptitiously change identities as a sales tactic.  Follow the Search Party video-podcast on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/search-party-channel Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank https://www.avidbank.com/ Boulay – Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf Mayer Brown https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg Oberle Risk Strategies https://oberle-risk.com/

Curt Black, CEO of a growing SaaS business, was a successful Google executive before deciding to pursue the path of Entrepreneurship-Through-Acquisition. His ETA journey introduced him to the founder of Aproove, who agreed to be acquired by Black and partners, then called the whole thing off.  Black finally managed to acquire the Aproove business in January 2025.  Through deal-search twists and turns, Black tried to differentiate himself as leader with a talent for solving SaaS go-to-market challenges, he tells Search Party. His search put him in contact with many successful SaaS CEOs, some of whom were looking for expansion ideas instead of exit events. Some highlights from Curt Black's conversation with Search Party's David Snow: • From Google sales to ETA operator. After nearly a decade at Google, Black leveraged his SaaS sales and management background to pursue ETA search. He built a search focused on software companies where technical founders needed commercial leadership. "My thesis was always, if I could find a good product, a good team and a founder who was more technically oriented, I could be the right person to lead that company moving forward." • The deal process paused and stalled before "boomeranging" a few months later. Black first connected with the Belgium-based founder of Aproove Work Management in late 2023, and discussions stretched over a year. In mid-2024, the process paused and both sides walked away. "A couple months later we got back together and we both decided this was a great fit for the future of the company." • Younger SaaS founders require a different ETA approach. Unlike aging Baby Boomer business owners often targeted by ETA searchers, Aproove's seller was a technical founder still interested in staying on as CTO. "The best sellers that I encountered were not as old as you might think," says Black. • ETA requires resilience when pipeline dries up. During the pause in negotiations, Black faced the uncertainty that haunts many searchers late in their funded search window: "I underestimated how challenging it can be. Some of the weeks you don't have deal pipeline. There’s a lot of lows in ETA that you need to have the grit to push through." Follow the Search Party video-podcast on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/search-party-channel Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank https://www.avidbank.com/ Boulay – Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf Mayer Brown https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg Oberle Risk Strategies https://oberle-risk.com/ Plexus Capital https://plexuscap.com/

In this insightful discussion, Anthony Walker, a veteran in ETA strategy at Next Coast Legacy, and Megan Webster from Mayer Brown share their expertise on building effective boards for lower-middle-market businesses. They delve into the critical need for accountability and character in board members, emphasizing that a strategic fit is more important than just a checklist. The duo also highlights the challenge of sourcing experienced members in a 'stretched-thin' market and the value independent members bring to the table, navigating the complexities of governance.

A decline in email response rates is forcing deal searchers to be more creative, says Entrepreneur-Through-Acquisition searcher Christine Koval, currently on the hunt for a lower-middle-market, back-office services business to acquire.  In an interview with Search Party, Koval notes the increasing competition to find deals in the vast US lower-middle-market, as well as the ubiquity of powerful business-outreach platforms that help deal searchers discover and contact business owners. The problem is, as every searcher has become armed with turbo-charged sourcing capabilities, business owners are becoming so inundated with inbound interest, their response rates have begun to plummet, requiring searchers to revert to pre-email methods, like cold-calling. “It is back to the olden days a little bit where your boots are on the ground, you're getting out there to learn, you're getting your face in front of business owners,” she said. Among the key takeaways of Koval's interview: Email outreach is fading—searchers must build in-person, personalized relationships. Koval emphasizes that email has become commoditized as more searchers adopt AI-enhanced bulk outreach, lowering reply rates and forcing a return to personal, high-effort engagement.  ETA differentiation has diminished—searchers must now sell themselves, not just the model.  As many pockets of the lower-middle-market M&A landscape becomes saturated with investors, ETA searchers can no longer rely on the novelty of their model to stand out. “Just selling the alternative to private equity isn’t a differentiator anymore,” says Koval. “So I focused on, where do I have a unique insight or what are the industries that I've worked in my past career where I can draw an initial connection with that business owner.” A compelling personal brand is now critical for effective deal sourcing: With searchers facing lower response rates and heightened competition, Koval has embraced thought leadership, podcasts and LinkedIn as essential tools for building trust before a first call. “As search continues to evolve, think of yourself as a personal brand,” she says. “You need a unique value proposition. You need to be different, and you want owners to get to see that as early as they can in the process.” Follow the Search Party video-podcast on LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/search-party-channel⁠ Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy ⁠https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p⁠ Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank https://www.avidbank.com/ Boulay - Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf Mayer Brown https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg Oberle Risk Strategies https://oberle-risk.com/ Plexus Capital https://plexuscap.com/

Professionalizing the finance function of a lower-middle-market business is one of the most impactful forms of value-creation a new CEO can pursue, according to a panel of Entrepreneurship-Through-Acquisition (ETA) market experts. To learn the importance of the finance function in ETA investments, Search Party convened a conversation between Anthony Walker, Managing Partner at Next Coast Legacy, Sam Swan, CEO of TaskRay, Eric Lougher, CFO/COO of TaskRay, Emily Young, Transaction Advisory Manager at Boulay and Jake Bitz, Consulting Controller at Boulay. TaskRay is an ETA-backed SaaS company that saw its operations transformed when it brought on board Lougher as CFO. The story of TaskRay's professionalized CFO function is at the core of this authoritative, candid and lively conversation.  Among the key takeaways of this episode of Search Party: • A common feature of founder-led companies in the lower-middle market is a heavy emphasis on cash flow and little emphasis on forward-looking financial metrics. Anthony Walker noted that this dynamic often leaves new owners without the reporting foundation they need to lead effectively. “They've measured the performance of their business by how much cash is in the bank account," says Walker of many lower-middle-market founders. "They're not looking at sophisticated metrics or KPIs.” • To build a finance function that supports both operational decision-making and investor transparency, operators must first assess the starting point and align it with their growth horizon. Emily Young described this as a deliberate diagnostic process that should precede any hiring or systems decisions: “The first step is - know the business. Know where it is today, know where you want it to be tomorrow, a year from now, five years from now.” • For first-time CEOs, the limits of their own financial fluency often surface early. Sam Swan reflected on his own transition, recalling how the budgeting process made it clear that finance couldn’t remain an isolated back-office task: “It was a struggle and that to me was a pretty clear indicator that I need someone who could do this with me.” Ultimately, a professionalized finance function doesn’t just improve decision-making in the present—it lays the groundwork for eventual exit. Jake Bitz underscored that buyers, lenders, and future acquirers all expect reliable financial operations: “Hiring the key people and having that process put in place for how you close the month and how you report is the foundation.” Follow the Search Party video-podcast on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/search-party-channel Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank https://www.avidbank.com/ Boulay - Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf Mayer Brown https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg Oberle Risk Strategies https://oberle-risk.com/ Plexus Capital https://plexuscap.com/ #M&A #search #privateequity #eta #searchfund #insurance

Small insurance brokerages make for "great" Entrepreneurship-Through-Acquisition deals, provided the acquirer has a deep understanding of the industry, says August Felker, an ETA searcher turned CEO of Oberle Risk Solutions. In an interview with Search Party, Felker shares his personal ETA journey to becoming the CEO of a leading lower-middle-market insurance brokerage, starting with being raised by a father who ran a St. Louis, Missouri, insurance brokerage. (Felker's grandfather also was an insurance broker).  Felker discovered the ETA model while working for two Stanford MBAs who had acquired a lower-middle-market logistics business, an experience that convinced him he wanted to follow the same path in his field of expertise. “When I first heard of the search fund, I was like, this is the coolest thing I’ve ever heard.” Felker's ETA search was fortuitous in two ways: He identified the company he ended up acquiring within a matter of weeks, and he was connected to the seller not by an investment banker, but by the editor of an insurance trade journal. “I said what I was trying to do, and this editor was like, ‘I know someone who's selling their business in Madison, Wisconsin. You want me to connect you with him?’” The most stressful part of the deal came late in the acquisition negotiation, when the seller pushed back on final contract terms, such as the earnout and non-compete. “We were so far in and committed," says Felker. "That really threw me for a loop.” Felker explains how the most impactful move he made as CEO was to hire three top-performing producers who dramatically boosted sales: “It’s like recruiting an NBA all-star. They came in and were writing so much new business it just totally changed the game.” Oberle Risk Services provides insurance to ETA-backed companies, among other lower-middle-market clients. "The ETA community is a great community," he says. "How can you not like someone who's risking their financial future and moving across the country? I mean, it's just the coolest thing.” Follow the Search Party video-podcast on LinkedInk: https://www.linkedin.com/company/search-party-channel Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank https://www.avidbank.com/ Boulay - Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf Mayer Brown https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg Oberle Risk Strategies https://oberle-risk.com/ Plexus Capital https://plexuscap.com/ #smallbusiness #finance #lending #privateequity #eta #searchfund

In this engaging discussion, ETA veteran Chandos Mahon, Managing Partner at Castle Capital, reflects on his journey leading Castle Tire through multiple acquisitions, emphasizing the vital role of lenders like Conor Tidgwell from Avidbank. Anthony Walker from Next Coast Legacy adds insights on supporting searchers in lower middle-market acquisitions. The trio underscores the importance of treating lenders as strategic partners. Transparent communication and financial flexibility are highlighted as keys to navigating the complexities of debt structure and ensuring growth.

As a growing number of MBA students become interested in Entrepreneurship-Through-Acquisition (ETA), a proper understanding of the challenges involved in finding and running a business is essential, say Austin Fruchter and Rohit Datta, Co-Presidents of the Columbia Business School ETA Club.  The Columbia ETA Club provides students with exposure to the ETA process, connecting them with investors, operators, and service providers to better understand the search opportunity. “Search is a relatively lonely process,” says Datta, adding that the club also plays a crucial role in building a support network for students before and after they graduate. Over the past year, interest in Columbia’s ETA club has surged, with events doubling and more students engaging in the ecosystem.  In a candid interview with Search Party, Fruchter and Datta describe common traits among ETA-oriented MBA students. Many are drawn to the tangible nature of small business ownership, seeking to step away from high-level corporate roles in favor of hands-on leadership. However, misconceptions persist—particularly about the level of personal commitment and operational complexity involved. “Some students don’t realize how ‘dirty’ it can get,” says Fruchter. The co-presidents also highlight the robust investor ecosystem surrounding Columbia’s ETA program. Investor interest is high, and Columbia students are encouraged to engage with potential backers early. “You don’t want your first interaction with an investor to be, ‘Hey, I need money,’” says Datta.  Fruchter and Datta themselves plan to partner on a search fund after graduation, and they discuss the benefits of partnered search. “It’s incredibly impactful to have someone who pushes you and refines your thinking,” says Fruchter.  Datta, who previously co-founded a SaaS company, agrees, noting that the right partnership can mitigate individual weaknesses. Looking ahead, the Columbia ETA leaders see institutional capital increasingly moving into the space. But they hope the ETA community’s emphasis on people remains its defining trait. “The people in the business drive the value creation,” says Fruchter. “Taking care of employees and empowering your team is a major factor behind the success of search-acquired businesses.” Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy [https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p] Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank [https://www.avidbank.com/] Boulay – Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team: [https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf] Mayer Brown [https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg] Plexus Capital [https://plexuscap.com/] Search Party video-podcast website: [https://lnkd.in/efJEa6GV]

Katie Walker, Principal at Plexus Capital, discusses the financial challenges CEOs face in ETA deals, emphasizing that 'hope is not a strategy' for growth. Mark Mullins, a sales consultant, highlights the critical need for structured sales systems to optimize performance. Dustin Sellers, Managing Partner at Next Coast Legacy, shares insights on the urgency of operational improvements post-acquisition. Together, they explore how new CEOs must navigate the complexities of sales execution and growth in leveraged environments, urging realism over optimism.

Shortly after acquiring security-camera service ⁠EyeQ Monitoring⁠ nine years ago, Markus Scott had no way of knowing he’d eventually grow revenue by a factor of 24. He was too busy dealing with “a whole list of terrible things” that indicated the business was doomed. In an interview with Search Party, Scott says, before detailing these tribulations: “This is the place where I should be pouring bourbon.” Scott’s path to profitable growth is an Entrepreneurship-Through-Acquisition (ETA) success story, but it started as a looming failure. The day the acquisition closed, the first-time CEO learned an employee had been accused of sexual harassment. Then the company’s servers contracted a virus. Then the bookkeeper quit. Then the seller tried to start a competing business. Scott says the deep relationships he built with his workers ended up improving team culture, which impacted customer satisfaction. Scott grew up in a middle-class home in Gainesville, Florida. His father was a former San Diego Charger turned educator, with an entrepreneurial side business to supplement the family income. Scott says he, too, eventually wanted to build a lasting business. When he learned about the ETA model, Scott enrolled in business school at Kellogg, and eventually raised north of $300,000 for a two-year search.  After a “devastating” month-fourteen deal collapse, Scott eventually found a very small business in a great industry. His investors, including Next Coast Legacy, encouraged him to structure the deal like a growth equity investment. Scott was a walk-on linebacker and fullback at the University of Florida. While his time on the field was minimal, Scott says the discipline of daily, grueling workouts prepared him for the roughness of entrepreneurial life. Search Party Lead Sponsor: Next Coast Legacy⁠ https://lnkd.in/eSAuRW5p⁠ Search Party Sponsors: Avidbank ⁠https://www.avidbank.com/⁠ Boulay - Contact Boulay's Search Fund Team:⁠ https://lnkd.in/eFF88SVf⁠ Mayer Brown ⁠https://lnkd.in/gU7sPPSg⁠ Oberle Risk Strategies ⁠https://oberle-risk.com/⁠ Plexus Capital ⁠https://plexuscap.com/⁠ Search Party video-podcast website:⁠ https://lnkd.in/efJEa6GV⁠