Views From the Market
Stikeman Elliott
Stikeman Elliott provides creative Canadian legal services to clients around the world.
In this series of 15-minute podcasts on private equity and midmarket M&A, with a focus on Canada, a wide range of industry participants discuss the deal market trends that they’ve been seeing. The host and originator of the series is Mario Nigro, M&A partner at Stikeman Elliott in Toronto.
Read more about Mario Nigro: https://bit.ly/3IkJsPJ
🔗 To stay connected and receive the latest updates, subscribe to our podcast on Soundcloud, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts
🔗 Follow Stikeman Elliott on LinkedIn for more insights
🔗 For more information and resources, visit stikeman.com/viewsfromthemarket
In this series of 15-minute podcasts on private equity and midmarket M&A, with a focus on Canada, a wide range of industry participants discuss the deal market trends that they’ve been seeing. The host and originator of the series is Mario Nigro, M&A partner at Stikeman Elliott in Toronto.
Read more about Mario Nigro: https://bit.ly/3IkJsPJ
🔗 To stay connected and receive the latest updates, subscribe to our podcast on Soundcloud, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts
🔗 Follow Stikeman Elliott on LinkedIn for more insights
🔗 For more information and resources, visit stikeman.com/viewsfromthemarket
Episodes
Mentioned books
Jan 26, 2023 • 18min
Episode 67: Filling the Growth Equity Gap for Late-stage Companies
Mario’s guest is Sanjiv Samant, manager of the Round13 Growth Fund at Toronto-based Round13 Capital. Sanjiv’s fund provides growth equity, typically in the range of $15-25 million, to companies that are approaching a liquidity event. Sanjiv and Round13 established this fund to provide the specific supports that companies need at this important stage – filling a gap in the Canadian market. Sanjiv and Mario also discuss the state of the deal market heading into 2023.
Jan 19, 2023 • 22min
Episode 66 – Between Friends: New Directions in German-Canadian M&A
In this podcast, Mario Nigro speaks with Stikeman Elliott’s Eric Bremermann, a specialist in acquisitions involving Canadian and European businesses – particularly those from German-speaking countries. In the past year, Eric has observed a surge in interest in Canadian critical mineral sector as European firms look to low-risk, “friendly” sources of key supply chain components, including lithium.
Jan 12, 2023 • 19min
Ep. 65 – How does the Canadian private equity market compare to the U.S. market and what's coming?
Joining Mario is Shez Bandukwala, Managing Director of KPMG’s Corporate Finance Group in Toronto. Shez recently brought his 30-years of investment banking experience to the Canadian private equity market. He notes the differences in the Canadian vs the U.S. market with the Canadian private equity market being, as yet much smaller, somewhat less efficient, more conservative in overall leverage and, generally, a less specialized market. He discusses strategic versus private equity buyers and cultural fit. He foresees that, despite a looming recession, the middle market will continue to find new opportunities in which to invest the substantial capital available.
Jan 5, 2023 • 19min
Episode 64 – Mixed Signals: A Midmarket Leader Looks Ahead to 2023
In this podcast, Mario is joined by Bruno Suppa, CEO of BDO Canada, an organization with a strong midmarket focus. While not downplaying the possibility of recession in 2023, Bruno foresees considerable resilience in Canadian midmarket M&A, thanks in part to factors such as the favourable U.S. exchange rate and private equity’s continuing capacity, in all economic conditions, to unlock value in small and medium businesses.
Dec 15, 2022 • 18min
Episode 63 – The Art of the Midmarket Deal: For Sellers, It’s About More Than Money
In this podcast, Mario Nigro speaks with Michele Middlemore, Managing Director of MC2 Business Advisors Inc., about the importance of understanding what truly matters to the midmarket seller. Preservation of corporate philosophy, retention of long-term employees and other non-monetary considerations are often top of mind for long-term operators entering the mysterious world of M&A for the first time. Michele’s experience has been that getting to know selling entrepreneurs as people can often be the difference between transactional success and failure.
Dec 8, 2022 • 23min
Episode 62 – Success After Success: Searching for a Second Career Challenge
Joining Mario is Anne Ristic, CEO of Agency Employment Services (AES). Anne, a longtime partner of Stikeman Elliott, recounts her decision to embark on a new career as of 2022, and how the search fund model allowed her to find a perfect fit in the form of AES, a growing HR back office business. She and Mario also discuss some of the challenges faced by a first-time CEO as well as the current state of the human resources marketplace.
Dec 1, 2022 • 20min
Episode 61 – The Right People in the Right Places: Trends in the Search for Talent
Human capital is the subject of today’s podcast, as Mario Nigro is joined by Ian Brenner of Farber Group in Toronto. The human side of business has taken centre stage in the past few years as companies struggle to retain talent at every level. The pandemic focused corporate attention on employee satisfaction and corporate culture, while, in a new development, the possibility of recession is putting a premium on executive-level talent with experience in past downturns. Join us for Ian’s insights into what may lie ahead.
Nov 10, 2022 • 16min
Episode 60 – Proceeding With Caution: What’s Next for Midmarket M&A in Canada
In this episode, Mario Nigro speaks with Ryan Farkas of BDO Canada. Ryan focuses on deals in the $10m-150m range across all industries, giving him a broad perspective on the state of the market at a time of rising interest rates, inflation and instability. While deal flow remains relatively robust, transactions are more challenging to complete as buyers take more time to understand the market they are buying into. Nevertheless, Ryan’s view is that the demographic drivers of midmarket M&A are not going away, even if multiples will inevitably come down from their pandemic-era peaks.
Nov 3, 2022 • 23min
Episode 59 – A True Middle Market Guy: From KPMG, Nomura And BMO To National Bank
Mario Nigro welcomes Alex Parker, co-head managing director of the National Client M&A Group at National Bank of Canada. Alex shares how National Bank’s integrated team grows its business outside of Québec while maintaining its focus on family and entrepreneur led businesses. Alex and Mario look to how different sectors are responding to recent market dynamics and Alex gives his thoughts on the “Covid fatigue” factor. Although Alex continues to see a “very robust market”, he foresees a slowdown coming.
Oct 20, 2022 • 23min
Episode 58: How One Firm's Unique Investment Strategy Creates Value and Growth for Small Businesses
Mario Nigro’s guest in this episode is Trish Higgins, Co-Founder and Partner of Chenmark. Chenmark is a Maine investment firm with a goal of acquiring, growing and holding on to small-to-medium sized businesses. Mario and Trish discuss Chenmark’s long-term investment perspective as it looks for steady businesses with a durable demand for their goods or services and a history of profitability that generates cash flows. Despite current uncertainty in the market linked to inflation and the possibility of reduced demand, Trish still sees lots of opportunity out there from a deal perspective.
