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- How investment banking relates to exit planning
- The sale process and which other advisors are involved
- Key steps in the transaction process
- Pre-transaction preparation
- Value of Quality IB
- Benefits of Competitive Process
- Current market overview
- Conversation points:
- What important aspects of a sale process?
- What it takes to achieve an optimized outcome?
- Most significant challenges encountered with owners?
- What has changed over the years related to exit execution?
- What rewards and penalizes a company’s value?
Learning Objectives:
- Understanding the value of engaging an investment banker
- What and who is involved in a sale process
- How can a business best prepare in advance to maximize the outcome of a sale
About the Presenters:
Learn from industry experts Artin Sedighan, President & Managing Director, Jeffrey Knakal, Managing Partner, David Bonrouhi, Managing Director, and Dennis Clapp as Moderator.
Thank you to our Sponsors
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Event Details
Who Should Attend?
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Attorneys
You have close relationships with clients, and can benefit from being the first advisor to introduce the idea of exit planning.
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CPAs/Accountants
Owners participating in the State of Owner Readiness research continue to indicate that you are the No. 1 "Most Trusted Advisor." You are a natural fit to lead the exit planning team and deepen your relationship (and retention) of next generation owners.
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Wealth Managers
You’re a skilled relationship person. Being entangled into your clients’ professional lives matters as you build a strategy to manage their wealth upon them harvesting it from their business. Exit planning allows you to build a deeper relationship with your client, expands your COI network, while giving you an early seat at table well before the liquidity event.
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Financial Advisors
One of the critical ‘legs of the stool’ is personal financing planning. An owner must have a strong financial plan & contingency plan post-transition to enable them to thrive in the next act of the lives personally and financially. Exit planning brings this future mindset into the present. Exit is now.
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Valuation Analysts
Valuation is both a billable engagement AND an opportunity to provide owners some perspective on how to accelerate value drivers (and deal with value killers). Use exit planning to make that valuation into a longer term value acceleration engagement.
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Investment Bankers
Only 2 of every 10 businesses that come to market actually sell. Learn how exit planning can bring attractive AND ready business to your purview.
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Estate Planners
Exit planning is a natural fit for estate planners who want to operate more holistically with their owner clients.
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Strategic Consultants
One of the most critical roles in exit planning is building transferable value. Strategic consultants have the ability to expand options and drive rapid business value that affect performance today.
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Insurance Professionals
Exit planning addresses the 5 D's. So do you. Approach the risk conversation differently with exit planning.
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Mergers & Acquisition Advisors
Proper exit planning causes less deals to fall through at the last minute. Connect with CEPAs to build your healthy deal flow network.
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Commercial Lenders
One of the best relationships a business owner makes is with their banker. How can you help your corporate clients think about the future and ensure financial continuity? Answer: exit planning.
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Members of Family Business Boards
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Private Business Owners
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Other Professional Advisors
Regardless of your unique specialty, there is seat at the exit planning table for you. Learn more at www.EarnCEPA.com.
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Family Business Advisors
More than 50% of lower middle market business owners would prefer to transition to the next generation. Help them succeed with exit planning strategies.
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Professional Advisors
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Business Consultants
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Other Business Professionals
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Business Owners
EXIT PLANNING IS GOOD BUSINESS STRATEGY
The Exit Planning Institute, provides Financial Advisors, Accountants, Consultants, and other advisors of business owners with the critical education to differentiate themselves and add value to their existing client relationships through a credential, conference, courses, and content. Download the CEPA brochure for more information.
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Meet Dennis Clapp, CFP®:
Dennis Clapp is an Executive Director with J.P. Morgan Private Bank in Los Angeles. He specializes in working with institutions and high net worth families to build and preserve assets by leveraging J.P. Morgan’s global platform. Dennis has over 15 years’ experience, having previously served as a Sr. Vice President with U.S. Trust, Bank of America Wealth Management and as Vice President with Wells Fargo Private Bank.
Board memberships have included: ACG101, Woodland Hills Tax & Estate Planning Council, Toastmasters Club #2847612, and Exit Planning Institute (Conejo Valley Chapter). Dennis earned his MBA in Finance and BA in Marketing, both from Loyola Marymount University. He completed his Certificate in Financial Planning from Boston University and holds the CFP™ designation.
Dennis is an avid offshore sailor, skier/snowboarder, and scuba diver.
Meet Artin Sedighan:
Artin Sedighan has been an investment banker since 2004 and has focused on both buy-side and sell-side mergers & acquisitions, capital markets, leveraged finance and restructuring transactions for small-to-large-cap public and private companies. Mr. Sedighan has advised clients in a broad array of industries including business services, consumer products, education, food & beverage, industrials, financial institutions, financial technology, media, specialty retail, technology and real estate.
Prior to joining Cappello, Mr. Sedighan was an industry and product generalist for Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s Investment Banking Division based in Los Angeles, where he joined after completing his M.B.A. Mr. Sedighan was also an industry generalist for Houlihan Lokey’s M&A Group, where he joined from Chanin Capital Partners’ M&A Group; both roles were based in Los Angeles. Prior to joining Chanin Capital Partners, Mr. Sedighan was an Analyst within HSBC’s Investment Banking Division where he was a real estate sector coverage banker in London and a M&A banker in New York.
Notable transactions include advising: Gusmer Enterprises, Inc., a leading manufacturer and distributor of a wide range of fermentation and filtration products for food, beverage and pharmaceutical applications, on its growth debt financing with Kayne Anderson Capital; Citadel Fitness LLC, a leading Planet Fitness franchisee, on its unitranche growth financing with ArrowMark Partners; Prologic Technology Systems, Inc. on its sale to Frontline Technology Holdings, LLC, a portfolio company of Thoma Bravo, LLC; MMGY Global LLC on its majority recapitalization transaction with Peninsula Capital Partners LLC; Sport Chalet, Inc. on its debt private placement with Crystal Financial and its sale to Vestis Retail Group; Chaotic Moon on its minority equity recapitalization and subsequent equity investment by William Morris Endeavor Entertainment; Ameron International Corporation, on its sale to National Oilwell Varco Inc.; Visa Inc. on its acquisition of PlaySpan Inc.; WASH Multifamily Laundry Services LLC on its sale to CHS Capital; Detection Logic Fire Protection Inc. on its sale to United Technologies Corp.; T-Systems International Inc. on its sale to Deere & Company; Batteries Plus LLC on its sale to Roark Capital Group; Legacy Estate Group LLC, parent company to wine producers Freemark Abbey, Arrowood and Byron, on its Section 363 asset sale to Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates Ltd.; Ronco Corporation on its Section 363 asset sale to Marlin Equity Partners; Kraft Foods Inc. on its sale of Stella D’oro to Brynwood Partners; and Warner Estate Holdings plc on its acquisition of Ashtenne Holdings plc. Mr. Sedighan received an M.B.A. from the Columbia Business School and a B.S. from the University of California, Berkeley.
Meet David Bonrouhi:
David Bonrouhi has over 20 years of investment banking and private equity experience. David began his investment banking career at Merrill Lynch in New York in the mid 1990’s where he worked on a number of M&A transactions, IPOs, private placements, high yield debt offerings and leveraged loan transactions in the media and telecom industries. David later worked in private equity and venture capital for UnionBanCal Equities, where he co-managed Union Bank’s $200 million portfolio of private equity investments in middle market companies in a wide range of industries, including consumer products, industrial manufacturing, business services, technology/internet/new media, telecom, publishing, radio and TV broadcasting, towers, energy and real estate. In this capacity, David was a Board member of several portfolio companies. David also founded a financial consulting firm, Blue Line Capital, and he previously spent approximately two years as a VP with Hunter Chase, a real estate private equity firm.
David began his career as a CPA and tax consultant with Price Waterhouse in New York. David holds Series 7, 63 and 79 licenses with Fallbrook Capital Securities Corporation (Calabasas Capital is a dba of Fallbrook Capital). David is a licensed California CPA (inactive) and a licensed California real estate broker.
David has an MBA in Finance and Entrepreneurial Studies from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management; and a Masters in Tax and a B.S. in Accounting from Miami of Ohio. David is active in the Los Angeles community with such organizations as Temple Isaiah, Gold Coast Business Forum, the Anderson Private Equity Alumni Association, Provisors, Bruin Professionals, the California Restaurant Association, and the Association for Corporate Growth (ACG). David is on the Board of the 101 Corridor Chapter of ACG, where he also serves as Sponsorship Chairman. In both 2016 and 2017, David was honored by the San Fernando Valley Business Journal which included him in their list of the Valley 200: The Most Influential Leaders in the Valley (which includes the San Fernando, Conejo, Santa Clarita, Simi and Antelope valleys in Southern California).
David is originally from Buffalo, NY and currently lives in Marina Del Rey with his wife and two sons.
Meet Jeffrey Knakal:
Jeffrey Knakal is a top performing investment banker. He is an investment banking thought-leader, and a strategic engineering center-of-expertise. Jeff built highly successful practices for three world-class firms in New York before embracing entrepreneurship via founding Growth Partners in 1994 and developing a next-generation investment banking model (vertically integrated), proprietary offerings (decision-making analytics for business owners), and a special set of practices, all dedicated to maximizing the value provided to clients beyond the confines of traditional investment banking. Jeff is a distinguished resource for companies and their owners.
Jeff is the Managing Partner of Growth Partners (GPI) which is a boutique investment banking firm (fully registered FINRA member) serving middle-market companies. The firm’s tag-line is “First we are Farmers.., and then we are Hunters™.” Based on a clinical assessment of investment banking, Jeff concluded important, if not critical, value could be provided to owners before the inflection point of a transaction, which ultimately would contribute to a superior transaction outcome, aside from improving traditional investment banking transaction processes. As such, he designed a synergistic bifurcated model entailing the following client offerings:
- • GPI’s first set of activities pertain to pre-transaction analytical assessments of a company related to both, “what is” (buyer preference alignment), and “what could be” (value-creation potential). The outcomes afford owners with the basis to make optimal build/sell decisions.
- • GPI’s second set of activities pertains to M&A and capital formation transaction execution with a liquidity event centricity. The capability is distinguished by sophisticated information disclosures (no PowerPoints), embedded value-creation plans and counterparty synergy analysis.
Jeff began his career with JP Morgan handling relationships and transactions with US multinationals in the northeast. He was then recruited to Credit Suisse to generate new business and proactively realize synergy among three affiliated firms (First Boston, CSFB and Credit Suisse) before being offered a position in Zurich. Thereafter, Jeff was the first American hired to build a US investment banking presence for Daiwa Securities (when Japan was liberalizing its capital market). He achieved “first-time” transaction events for Colgate-Palmolive and Aetna Life.
Jeff received a Bachelor’s degree from the Wharton School, at the University of Pennsylvania (finance major), and a Master of Business Administration from the Stern School, at New York University (finance major).
Jeff has closed transactions totaling almost $1 billion in value for companies residing in most industries for GPI. He also founded and initially developed two manufacturing companies with each achieving revenues of $100 million (developed the supply-chain thesis, acquired the targets, recruited the management teams, prepared the build-plans and raised the capitalization structures). Jeff is a student of strategic development and advocates “Purple Ocean” strategies. He is an expert regarding valuation and crafting compelling narratives related to the sale of a company. Jeff has given speeches at MIT, Duke, Boeing, the Conference Board, etc., published a set of eight tutorial articles for C-Suite Quarterly, and is in the process of writing a book called “Optimal Exits.” Jeff’s greatest competency pertains to nurturing business owners, while earning their trust.
To best serve the heroes of the American economy, which are entrepreneurial business owners, by ensuring their courage and resolve are justly rewarded through a well-deserved maximized liquidity event return.
