What Is a Fractional CPO? (And When You Actually Need One)
A fractional Chief Product Officer provides full CPO-level product leadership on a part-time basis. Here’s what the role covers, what it isn’t, and when your company actually needs one.
-
-
What Destroys Business Value (and What Protects It)
The factors that compress multiples in lower middle-market transactions, and the specific actions that protect value when you need it most.
-
How to Prepare Your Business for a Professional Valuation
What you gather before the process starts determines how clean the output is. The complete document checklist for a lower middle-market business valuation.
-
EBITDA Multiples by Industry: 2025 Reference for Business Owners
Where your sector trades and what moves you above or below the midpoint. Data from lower middle-market transactions covering 10 industry sectors.
-
Business Valuation Methods: Which One Applies to Your Company
Five valuation approaches, each serving a different purpose. Understanding which one a buyer will use changes everything about how you position your business.
-
How Much Is My Business Worth?
The real answer requires a professional process, not a formula. Here’s what actually drives value in a lower middle-market business transaction.
-
Private Credit Has Replaced Bank Debt in Many LMM Deals. Here Is What Sellers Need to Know.
Something shifted in the lower middle market financing landscape over the past three years that most business owners have not noticed: private credit funds have displaced traditional bank debt in a meaningful number of acquisition transactions. The implications for sellers are real. Private credit lenders operate differently from banks. They move faster, are more flexible…
-
Mezzanine Financing in Lower Middle Market Deals: What Sellers Need to Know About How Buyers Get Funded
When a buyer offers you $12M and their capital stack includes something called “mezzanine financing” or “subordinated debt,” here is what that means for you as the seller: a specialized lender is providing the buyer with capital that sits between the bank loan and the buyer’s own equity. It is more expensive than bank debt,…
-
Installment Sale (Section 453): Spreading Your Capital Gains When Selling Your Business
If you sell your business for $8M and receive all $8M at closing, you recognize the entire capital gain in a single tax year. At a combined federal rate of approximately 23.8%, you could owe roughly $1.9M in federal taxes on the gain, all due on April 15 of the following year. If you sell…
-
Buy-Sell Agreement Insurance: Cross-Purchase vs Entity Redemption and the Tax Difference at Exit
If your business has more than one owner and you do not have a funded buy-sell agreement, you have a problem that does not feel like a problem yet. It will feel like one the morning something happens to one of you. A buy-sell agreement is a contract between co-owners that specifies what happens to…
