Search Fund & Entrepreneurship through Acquisition

I've lived every stage of the ETA journey myself: raising capital, sourcing and diligencing more than a hundred businesses, closing acquisitions, and then running the companies for the long haul. I run Decada Group, a self-funded holding company that has acquired five businesses and started three, all held permanently. The coaching draws on that seat time and on years inside the ETA community, including a Utah searcher network several hundred strong. I've watched searches produce great owner-CEOs, and I've watched them break people who bought the wrong company. I coach to help you land in the first group: honest pressure-testing before you buy, and a steady thinking partner once you own it.

I have experience structuring a self-funded search, evaluating deals, conducting due diligence, working with sellers, and modeling post-transaction financials. I can help those who are considering this path, are mid-search, or are in the final innings of a deal. In 2022, as an MBA student at Yale School of Management, I took three courses on ETA and wrote two papers with A.J. Wasserstein, Pioneer in the world of Search and ETA. I fell in love with the model and determined that I needed to find a way to do this for my career. Following my MBA, I interned at a Traditional Search fund investor for the summer and learned a great deal about what investors look for in Searchers. Following a two-year stint in Management Consulting, I decided to pursue a self-funded search in my home state of Utah. After 6 months of full-time search, I found a small company at which I was hired with the intention to acquire the company (Acqui-hire) and which I will close by late Summer 2025.

With over two decades of experience in finance and business acquisitions, I am passionate about helping aspiring entrepreneurs navigate the search fund process. As the CEO of Owner Actions and an owner in 20+ small businesses, I expertly guide clients through the complexities of acquiring businesses, from deal sourcing to post-acquisition operations. My background in managing high-value portfolios and advising on strategic objectives equips me with the insights needed to support your journey. Having coached well over 100 individuals on their business-buying journey, I am committed to providing personalized guidance to help you achieve your business acquisition goals.

TLDR: Started self-funded search fund in 2023, acquired business 8 months later, have been successfully scaling it ever since. After being the CEO for two private equity backed companies, I wanted to branch out on my own and control more of the pie. I found that constraints from the PE model sometimes negatively influenced business decisions and I wanted to have more control over how to improve and scale a business (not to mention the capital structure). Six months after beginning my search, I submitted the LOI for the business I ultimately closed on two months later. I've been running that business since June of 2024 and we've been growing it nicely while paying down debt. I explored both traditional and self-funded search and completed diligence across a wide range of industries. I've looked at proprietary and brokered deals, received compelling financing terms from lenders and equity investors alike, and have gone through the full ETA cycle. I'm a regular speaker at SMBootCamp and have robust experience with M&A from my previous investment banking and private equity experience. I feel lucky to be doing what I'm doing right now and would love to help others achieve their goals within the Search Fund/ETA space.

Welcome to my profile! I have 5+ years of experience in ETA & consulting. I founded Pondr Group where I bought 3 digital marketing companies via self funded searches and sold 1 for a 10x return in 2 years prior to attending Harvard Business School where I have personally met 50+ people who have bought companies via traditional and self funded searches and 50+ investors in the space. I also founded a company Midstone Service Group that buys and holds essential service businesses. I can assist you in searching, due diligence and closing acquisitions With a robust background in both consulting and entrepreneurship, I am well-equipped to guide you through the intricacies of search-fund ventures. As a former Associate Consultant at Bain & Company, I honed my skills in private equity due diligence and growth strategy, which are crucial for identifying and scaling successful acquisitions. Currently, as a Co-founder of Midstone Service Group and Managing Partner at Pondr, I have firsthand experience in building and scaling businesses through strategic acquisitions. My academic journey includes an MBA from Harvard Business School, further solidifying my expertise in business strategy and operations. Let's connect to discuss how I can help you navigate your search-fund journey and achieve your entrepreneurial goals!

I don't just teach acquisition enterpreneurship — I'm doing it right now. I'm an independent sponsor actively sourcing, evaluating, and closing acquisitions of healthcare and essential-services businesses, and I built the toolkit for it over years as an M&A banker at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and a Vice President in Healthcare Investment Banking at Goldman Sachs, where I advised on deals from $200M to $11B+. That means I can help you with the parts of the journey that actually make or break an ETA practitioner: building an LBO and returns model that holds up under scrutiny, structuring the deal and the financing, running diligence, negotiating the LOI, and thinking clearly about valuation and risk. Whether you're pursuing a self-funded search, a traditional search, or an independent-sponsor model, I'll help you move from thesis to closed deal with institutional-grade rigor and I would be honest with you about which targets are worth chasing and which aren't. More importantly, I bring the perspective of someone signing the documents on his own deals, not advising from the sidelines.

I was involved in 2 German buy and build PE backed acquisitions with a total investment capital of EUR 120m. One became one of the largest insurance brokers in Germany valued at over EUR 2bn and the other is the largest German property manager managing 115,000 apartments and will likely sell in the next 24 months

Welcome to my profile! Having successfully acquired 3 businesses (2 personally and 1 as a minority investor), I have a wealth of experience in what worked, what didn't work, mindsets required for success and pitfalls to avoid.

I am highly experienced in ETA, with multiple internships and coursework at Wharton in the space.

I bring real, lived experience across the full ETA lifecycle. Through my HBS background and long-standing ties to the original search fund community (Rick and Royce, IYKYK), I operate inside a deep network of searchers, operators, and investors active in the space. I’ve personally run a self-funded search and now serve as CEO of a portfolio company, leading real operations and real P&Ls. My coaching is practical, direct, and grounded in what actually works when you’re sourcing, conducting diligence, buying, and scaling a business