The Toolkit

Buying a company is one of the most expensive purchases possible. Investment bankers facilitate the buying and selling of companies and related financing. This episode focuses on the process of advising companies and investment firms to help the buying go smoothly.

Doug Lovette is the founder and Managing Director of Third Coast Capital Advisors, a firm that helps private equity groups and companies develop a strategy to grow by buying other companies. Once the strategy is developed, Doug and his team find companies to buy, secure the interest of business owners and manage all sides throughout the process.

This episode is relevant to anyone looking to buy a company, sell their family business or manage a very important relationship.

Third Coast Capital Advisors: https://www.thirdcoastca.com/team

Find Justin on Twitter: https://twitter.com/justinpfortier

Jargon

• Middle Market = companies between roughly $50M-1B in revenue
• Sell-side = activities related to selling companies, shares in companies or debt
• Buy-side = activities related to buying companies, shares in companies or debt
• Private Equity - investment groups that own private companies (not trading on the stock market) and assets
• M&A = mergers and acquisitions
• Merger = joining two companies
• Acquisition = buying a company

Related Videos

1. Wharton panel on growth through acquisition: https://youtu.be/p0Bx6UtherQ
2. Talk on managing client relationships by Goldman Sachs Partner Jim Donovan: https://youtu.be/z8kqCIxXTEw

This episode is all about who actually owns music and how they get paid. I sit down with one of the largest investors in music royalties to understand how it all works.

Josh Gruss is the Chairman, CEO and founder of Round Hill Music.

Prior to founding Round Hill Music, Josh Gruss was previously a partner at Gruss & Co., a private investment firm based in New York City. He also worked in investment banking at Bear Stearns & Co. Before his career in finance, Gruss worked at Sony Music, Atlantic Records, and Clear Channel’s Live Music Division. Gruss earned his B.A. from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and an MBA from both Columbia University and London Business School. He served in the U.S. Coast Guard for six years.

Follow Justin: https://twitter.com/justinpfortier

Edward Peter Stringham is the Davis Professor of Economic Organizations and Innovation at Trinity College. He has extensively studied self-regulation and enforcement among private groups or individuals that fill a void that government enforcement cannot. In this episode, we explore the history of stock exchanges and the consequences of regulation through the lens of the burgeoning crypto ecosystem. 

Read Ed's book: Private Governance: Creating Order in Economic and Social Life

Follow Justin on Twitter

Cortec Group Co-President Dave Schnadig joined to discuss what he's learned from running an operationally intensive Private Equity firm.

At Cortec he has nurtured the development of companies like Chauvet, Groundworks, and YETI where they turned a $67 million investment into $3.3 billion during Dave's 7-year term as Chairman.

They are now investing out of their 7th fund, which is $2.1B.

In this episode we talked about:

• Identifying good companies to buy
• Developing a firm
• The two biggest areas where founders underinvest

Talk to me on Twitter: @justinpfortier

Check Out Cortec Group: cortecgroup.com

House music DJ & producer Carlos Cid (known as CID), joined me to talk about sustaining a career in music, starting his new label, and the steps required to be able to perform music in front of crowds around the world. CID is an incredible producer who has put out songs with Kaskade, Don Diablo, Loud Luxury and official remixes for Diplo, Lizzo an Ellie Goulding. He has over 100 million plays on Spotify and his songs are frequently featured on top playlists and radio shows. His music does very well commercially, but he also embraces a more underground sound for some of his touring, playing top house music clubs in addition to his circuit of larger festivals. 

In the episode CID talks about:

• Making his grammy nominated remix of "Audio"
• Balancing producing music and performing as a DJ
• Launching his label "Night Service Only"
• The importance of the right management team
• Building your own fan base in the era of Spotify
• Landing a weekly Sirius XM radio show and how he puts his episodes together
• Relationships drive success in music

CID’s beginnings on Will Joy’s Podcast:

https://soundcloud.com/backtobackpod/episode-67-cid

CID’s music:

Spotify

https://soundcloud.com/cidmusic

On Google & Youtube, avoid lots of results for an Indian Police Drama TV show by searching, CID Music or cidmusic.

For those interested in pursuing a creative, performance-driven career, this Toolkit episode builds on the advice in Ep. 3 Jared Freid.

Richard Mejia Jr. became a partner the the accounting firm EY in 1983. A new opening at the San Diego office in 1988 catalyzed his transition into working primarily in Life Sciences and Technology. From 2001 to 2008 he headed up the entire Pacific Southwest Life Sciences Practice. Under his leadership, the San Diego office grew from a single partner to a well-structured practice with ~$14 million a year in annual revenue. His extensive experience in securities, debt offerings and M&A transactions earned him board seats on several publicly traded technology companies and Sharp Health, a large hospital system in San Diego.

We discussed scaling an organization with good processes, nurturing a talent pipeline, networking, and other essential topics for building a world-class professional services firm.

Jared Freid is a NYC Comedian. His comedy is current and reflects the ordinary daily thoughts of millennials and beyond. He’s a regular at the Comedy Cellar, Caroline’s on Broadway, Gotham, Stand Up New York and Comix at Mohegan Sun. He performed at the 2017 “New Faces” showcase at the 35th annual Just For Laughs festival in Montréal. He is a co-host of the "U-up" podcast and host of his own JTrain podcast, which has over 450k downloads a month.

I brought Jared on to discuss how he took the leap to start in comedy, what strategies he used to build his audience and what he is working toward.

Since the Coronavirus has created immense challenges across the global supply chain, I wanted to discuss the tools government and industry have to address threats. In Episode #2, Col. Alex Vohr USMC, (Ret.) brings 30+ years of logistics experience across the Marines, Florida East Coast Railway and New Fortress Energy. In his former role as Director for Logistics -J4, he was responsible for directing all operations, engineering, and medical planning and execution for all U.S. Department of Defense activities in South and Central America and the Caribbean. In addition to serving in Operations Iraqi Freedom I, Desert Shield and Desert Storm, he led relief operations in Haiti, the Philippines and Puerto Rico.

Robb McDaniels is a media and technology entrepreneur, investor and current CEO of Beatport. Beatport is an online record store, founded in 2004 as the principal source of music for DJs. In an era dominated by streaming, Beatport has grown its download sales over the last few years.

Robb began his career in finance after graduating from Trinity College in Hartford, CT. He then spent four years at Marsh and MacLennan in their investment banking and structured finance unit. During his tenure at Marsh, he moved to San Francisco where he founded INgrooves in 2002. He built the company into a full-service distribution and artist services operation. Under his leadership, INgrooves managed North American digital distribution for Universal Music Group, as well as more than 4 million songs for thousands of artists and labels. As CEO, he grew the company from nothing $130m revenue and nearly 200 employees.

Just before becoming Beatport’s CEO, 2016, McDaniels launched Faction Entertainment; technology enabled artist management platform, which he wound down in 2018. 

Through discussing his past ventures, Robb provided unique perspectives from across tech, finance and media. His past wins and challenges shed light what it takes to execute an idea from conception to operating at a global scale.

Email me at [email protected] with any suggestions, comments or questions - I appreciate you listening!