From Elon Musk to Exit of His Own
Ben Kellie got his start in the aerospace industry helping Elon Musk figure out how to get his rockets to land on a floating barge without blowing up.
In 2015, Kellie left SpaceX to start The Launch Company where they supply hardware parts and consulting to a growing list of new aerospace companies like SpaceX. Less than five years after starting, Kellie was approached by Voyager Space, a private equity-backed group rolling up new space companies.
The External vs. Internal Sale
Barry Wood sold two virtually identical businesses over an 18 year period. The first was external and the second, internal. His exits clearly show the differences in an as close to apples-to-apples comparison as possible. The pros and cons may surprise.
Inside Uptime’s 7-Figure Acquisition of JurisPage
Andy Cabasso co-founded JurisPage, a marketing agency specializing in helping law firms in 2013.
Three years later, JurisPage had service contracts with more than 200 law firms when they got a call from Uptime Legal, an Inc. 5000 business specializing in technology and practice management software for law firms.
How to Know When Your Idea Has Legs
Melissa Kwan and her co-founder built Spacio, a company that helped real estate agents win and manage leads that come from hosting open houses.
Kwan built the company to roughly 100,000 agents using Spacio when a chance encounter at an industry conference led to an acquisition offer from HomeSpotter.
Your Training Wheels Business
something else. Hear his story on this week’s episode.
Double an Offer, Without Turning off an Acquirer
Wes Mathews built High Level Marketing, a digital advertising agency, to $6.5 million in annual revenue. The business was thriving, but when COVID hit, Mathews started to question the risk he was shouldering employing 49 people. It was around that time that Mathews received an email that would change his life forever.
Buy low, sell high
John Ratliff started Appletree Answers in a spare bedroom of his house in 1995 and by 2012 had grown it to 650 employees and 24 locations when he decided it was time to sell.
Getting A Second Bite Of The Apple
Richard Manders co-founded iAutomation and built it up to $12M before deciding it was time to recapitalize. Manders sold 75% of his company for almost 8 times EBITDA to a Private Equity Group (PEG) and held 25% interest in the company after the sale.
How to Create a Bidding War Plus Three Other Lessons
This week’s episode of Built to Sell Radio is the Intel edition. We focus on four recent guests and highlight the strategies that made their companies built to sell.
How to Attract the Acquirer You Crave
Anthony Fracchia built Altruis Benefit Consulting to $2.5 million in revenue when he started to get unsolicited calls from potential buyers. He initiated conversations with an acquirer only to learn they planned to gut his staff and kill his brand.
The Shotgun Breakup
Back in 2006, Michael Kaplan and his partners bought into a Zerorez Carpet and Living Surfaces Care franchise. The business was generating $300,000 in revenue and losing $40,000 a year.
By 2019, the company was generating $17 million in revenue when Kaplan and his partner had an irreconcilable dust-up which led to Kaplan triggering their shotgun partnership agreement.
Turning the Tables on John
By now, you’re accustomed to hearing John Warrillow ask the tough questions.
Every month, we turn the tables and grill John on his favorite anecdotes and transferrable lessons from the latest batch of guests on Built to Sell Radio. In this episode, Dr. Jeremy Weisz gets John to reflect on what stood out, any missed opportunities, and how each story imparts the Built to Sell Methodology.