Smart Business Dealmakers: The Middle-Market M&A Podcast

In four short years, Detroit-based startup Airspace Link went from a couple founders and a few employees to recently raising $23 million in a Series B to aid its global expansion. It started with a $100,000 convertible note, a $3 million pre-seed, a $10 million Series A and now the global expansion raise. Michael Healander, co-founder, president and CEO, is a drone pilot enthusiast who envisions the positive impact drones could provide to economies and quality of life. His company is creating a roadmap in the sky for drones of all types and sizes.

Rocco DiLillo has lived the entrepreneurial experience. He's operated 10 companies — five he founded and five he acquired, taken a company public, rescued struggling businesses and realized successful exits. His passion for building businesses compelled him out of his first retirement in his mid-40s. And even today — many years later as he begins to divest himself of his business holdings — he finds himself drawn back in by opportunity. DiLillo share some the highlights from his decades of experience, including one of his most recent exits from the North Carolina manufacturer, PCX.

Boon Logic, developer of machine-learning based anomaly detection algorithm, is completing its second funding round over the last four years with a nearly $40 million pre-money valuation to support the commercialization of two disruptive services. CEO Grant Goris sits down to discuss how the company was born, how it has grown, and what he's learned about raising capital along the way.

Mike Moran is the CEO and Managing Partner of Walnut Ridge, multigenerational family office managing investment activities and controlling interest in a number of operating and start-up companies. He stops by to talk about the family office perspective — what they look for in potential acquisition targets, how they differ from other buyer types, and why and in what circumstances a family office is the likely best choice for a seller.

Late in 2020, Updox, a software collaboration platform for out-of-hospital healthcare providers, was acquired by EverCommerce. That year, the pandemic had created for Updox conditions that would make it the busiest time in the company's history as telehealth became a critical channel for both patients and service providers. Former Updox CEO Mike Morgan talks about laying the groundwork for that event, which reportedly led to the company's $143 million exit.

Dr. Shante Williams has had a remarkable career, one that started as a Research Associate studying how tumor cells migrate to founding two investment firms. Now, as the founder and CEO of Black Pearl Global Investments, she's focused on health care companies with investments that create long-term, sustainable growth while also backing several initiatives that seek to create more successful black, brown and women entrepreneurs, investors and fund managers.

Michael Schreiber knows something about disruption. He was on the team that founded and launched Hulu and led some of the media industry's first digital distribution deals. Now he's leading PlayFly Sports, a full-service sports marketing company managing multimedia rights for universities, state high school associations and other properties, including esports. The fledgling company, with significant backing from Sinclair Broadcast Group and Access Holdings, has already made a slew of acquisitions and grown from a single employee to more than 700. Schreiber talks about building PlayFly, the opportunity in the market it addresses as well as how he deals with doubters when introducing disruptive innovation in the market.

Is it the best of times or is it the worst of times? With market signals suggesting both economic strength as well as indications that a recession is coming — or that we're in one, or that one isn't coming — uncertainty is the only certainty and it's gripped the investor mindset, shaping perspectives that are driving real changes in where they're putting their dollars, which, of course, has entrepreneurs reacting. JumpStart Ventures President Jerry Frantz joins offers his view of the early-stage market, and what's happening with investors and entrepreneurs.

Park Place Technologies' Kelly Greene has helped the company write its M&A playbook. From director of human resources to VP of Mergers and Acquisitions and now VP of Corporate Development, she's completed more than 20 deals for the company, including the recent acquisition of Park Place's largest competitor. She talks about how the M&A process has evolved over her seven years with the company, offers tips on post-deal integration, and shares how a team of stay-at-home moms has added speed and efficiency to the company's deals.

From Faith Voinovich's position as principal at Ohio Innovation Fund, she's seeing an increase in new blood via internships interested in entrepreneurship, eager to work with or start new ventures that can make an impact through meaningful work. Illustrating that change, she says applications for internships with the Fund have gone from a couple hundred to nearly 5,000 in a few years for just five spots. She talks about what she's seeing on the ground as an investor with an Ohio focus, as well as how investment sourcing at the Fund has been affected by the pandemic and ongoing economic uncertainty.