In addition to being a senior advisor at Battery Point Capital, Brian co-founded Seabrook Partners in January 2011. Prior to Seabrook Partners, he spent five years as a Managing Director and National Head of the Capital Strategies Group at Citigroup and then Morgan Stanley following the sale of Smith Barney by Citigroup to Morgan Stanley. The Capital Strategies Group provided M&A services to middle-market companies in the U.S. During the five years Brian ran the Group, it completed more than 110 transactions with aggregate value exceeding $3 billion.
Brian spent three years at Aether Systems, first as Executive Vice President, Corporate Development and later as President, Enterprise Solutions Division, Aether’s largest operating division. Brian was instrumental in transforming Aether from a 20-person private company with an annual revenue run rate of $1 million into one of the leading wireless data companies in the world with annual revenues in excess of $100 million. He was responsible for managing the company’s acquisitions, joint ventures and public equity and debt offerings.
Brian ran the East Coast Technology Group at Smith Barney in New York where he worked from 1988-1998. Brian began his investment banking career at E.F. Hutton in 1986 and later worked for Robertson, Colman & Stephens in San Francisco.
At Battery Point Capital (BPC), Tim specializes in analyzing company and brand positioning, go-to-market strategies, and digital marketing/sales enablement for all BPC portfolio companies. He also oversees our joint venture with The Inforefinery, a leading lead generation firm.
Tim has over 25 years experience in the public and private capital markets, investment banking and asset management. As an investment banker and capital markets specialist, he has raised more than $10 billion of debt and equity capital for companies in the retail, utility, energy, manufacturing and technology industries.
While a capital markets specialist at Chase, Merrill Lynch, and ABN Amro, Tim specialized in corporate finance advisory, rating agency advisory and capital structure optimization for large public companies like Walmart, International Paper, General Motors, and General Electric. As an adviser at Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo, Tim advised entrepreneurs on growing, improving and selling their businesses.
Jay Wright has over twenty years of experience in finance and public markets. As the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer or Chief Financial Officer of three public companies over the past eleven years, he has structured numerous private and public financing transactions. He also served as Chief Financial Officer for TAMSCO, a privately held government contractor, which he helped sell for $83.5 million in 2003, and was a founding shareholder of Chesapeake Government Technologies, which was acquired by Widepoint Corporation (Amex: WYY) in 2004. He has expertise in all aspects of structuring private placements and in creating exits via mergers and acquisitions and open market sales.
Previously, Mr. Wright worked as an investment banker with Merrill Lynch in New York and a mergers and acquisitions lawyer with Foley & Lardner in Chicago and Skadden, Arps in New York. Mr. Wright received his law degree from the University of Chicago Law School and his Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Georgetown University, summa cum laude, where he also serves as an adjunct finance professor. Mr. Wright is a member of the Illinois state bar and is Series 7, 24 and Series 66 qualified. Mr. Wright is the co-author of Finance and Accounting for Nonfinancial Managers, Sixth Edition (Perseus Books, 2010).
Kevin has over 30 years of investment banking experience. Kevin has worked on a broad range of M&A and corporate finance transactions, both domestic and cross-border, including leveraged buyouts, acquisitions, divestitures, initial public offerings, high yield financing transactions and private capital raises.
As an investment banker at Salomon Brothers, Merrill Lynch and Bank of America, Kevin’s clients have included corporations, boards of directors, private equity firms and individual owners. Kevin’s transactions have spanned a large range of industries, including packaging, consumer products, transportation, oil and gas, renewable energy and health care.
Representative clients include International Paper, Sealed Air, Chesapeake, Grief Industries, Kennametal, Plastipack, MeadWestvaco, AGCO, True Brew, Spear Power Systems, H2Bev, Shorty’s, and Saratoga Chips.
Our Process & Resources
Our Investment Criteria
Battery Point Capital is an investment-oriented family office, formed to make control-oriented buyout investments in established lower middle-market U.S. companies as well as earlier stage, fast growing companies that are not yet profitable.
We prefer to make growth equity investments, both minority and control, in the following company types:
Building Sales & Marketing
By far, the leading reason companies raise capital is to invest in sales and marketing. Once product-market fit is established, companies should be focused on building a great sales and marketing process.
In our experience, this requires companies to leverage the most relevant marketing channels and marketing technology in order to scale. Whether this is executed via outsourcing or by building teams and processes internally is company specific – both approaches work, though we prefer outsourcing.
By far, the leading reason companies raise capital is to invest in sales and marketing. Once product-market fit is established, companies should be focused on building a great sales and marketing process.
In our experience, this requires companies to leverage the most relevant marketing channels and marketing technology in order to scale. Whether this is executed via outsourcing or by building teams and processes internally is company specific – both approaches work, though we prefer outsourcing.
Most of the companies we speak to spend far too little on sales and marketing (between 0 and 5%).
Your spend will depend on the opportunity – larger markets with good opportunities and low competition demand a budget of 20% or more of revenue for sales and marketing.
The rule of thumb for established and/or smaller companies ($5mm or less in revenue) is 5-10% of revenue should be allocated to sales and marketing efforts.
For faster growing companies (30% or more YOY growth), it is not uncommon to see budgets of 30-50% of revenue.
We are major proponents of outsourcing sales & marketing for most of our portfolio companies, at least in the early stages. The complexity and execution risk in the modern go-to-market effort is substantial, and the requisite talent to execute is simply too hard to find.
Even for larger companies with substantial revenue, we have pushed out the horizon on bringing sales and marketing in house. Better to allocate that capital to professional support, onboarding, training new clients etc.
For marketing to be effective, it needs to be innovative and engaging, so relying on your own staff will only get you so far. Outsourcing connects you with marketing agencies that can stay on top of new technology and trends.
In a perfect world, a company would have a clear idea of how they would allocate the capital we might provide. The level of detail in your plan will vary by industry, but here are our general views:
In 2020, after countless interviews with external agencies, we decided to create a joint venture with a leading database company and a leading paid media company to deliver services to our portfolio clients.
We now have substantially more control over the fate of our investments and can deliver best-in-class services to our companies. The specialists working with our clients have decades of marketing experience.
This joint venture is focused on delivering value in the core tasks and marketing channels as we see them – SEO & content marketing, web redesign, email marketing, paid search and social media marketing.
Growing via Acquisition
At Battery Point, we often provide capital for acquisitions and we have extensive career experience in increasing the valuation of a business via M&A driven growth strategies. We are able to help our partners drive value via acquisition through the following advantages and experience:
M&A execution is our core skill. Because acquisitions are our expertise, we often focus on acquisitions to add on to our existing portfolio companies whenever possible. We have extensive in eliminating overlapping costs post acquisition, allowing our portfolio companies to concentrate on growth opportunities.
We understand the need for thorough due diligence & research. We understand that much of our return on investment in an acquisition-based strategy is based on an ability to acquire businesses in the best way possible from the start and to minimize their risk. We are aggressive in sharing our M&A experience with our portfolio companies, providing them substantial help in identifying acquisition targets that fit their criteria. Prior, we help perform substantial industry and competitor research as well as generate valuation estimates. We can also help our companies identify underperforming businesses that can be improved through better management and proper investment in critical areas.
We are experienced in the upgrade. As soon as an acquisition is completed, we help our partners establish strong financial controls, internal reporting, eliminate unprofitable units, streamline operations, and help management to identify operational inefficiencies. We also know the importance of having excellent software and IT operations and encourage our partners to move quickly to upgrade to the best available solutions that provide enhanced business analytics to support better decision making.
We can help with use of appropriate leverage. We help our partners access debt capital to fund an acquisition strategy, as leverage sets up a much higher internal rate of return (IRR) in the long run while also allowing our companies to consider large, transformative acquisitions. As important, we understand how to leverage the balance sheet of the target acquisition to close larger acquisitions.
Minority Equity Investments
As a growth equity investor, minority positions are more the rule than an exception, so we are prepared to work with companies to create investment structures that fit best with their objectives. In fact, we see minority investments as potentially more advantageous than control stakes for the following reasons:
Better investments: Companies selling minority stakes often have more attractive growth prospects, specific expansion plans, and clear roadmaps for investing the capital raised
Confidentiality and reduced execution risk: Sellers often don’t want to publicize their desire to attract a third-party partner and sell a minority stake, fearing adverse publicity and customer fallout if the transaction fails. Unlike the vast majority of control deals, minority deals are typically not consummated through formal auctions.
Competitive advantage for patient capital: Minority stakes usually provide early participation in the growth of companies, and allows us to build relationships with owners rather than simply participating in a public auction. Investing in building relationships with family owners and senior managers takes time and effort, but we have learned that all the calls, meetings, and industry conferences eventually pays off.
We do consider a variety of factors and take certain steps when making minority investments:
When they work: Minority ownership interests can work well when the key means of value creation are related to top-line growth and governance. These include facilitating organic or inorganic cross-border growth, professionalizing management teams and processes, enhancing governance, and consolidating fragmented sectors.
When they don’t: Minority investing can become problematic, however, when the investment thesis hinges on activities such as creating value through restructuring, improving operational performance, cost cutting, and supply chain initiatives. In these instances, majority ownership and a hands-on, control-oriented approach are often more appropriate.
.
Recruiting Talent
Don’t let business strategy be developed absent a thoughtful conversation on what talent needs you will have over the next months and years to execute on the strategy. In our experience, HR is too often trying to catch up to the staffing needs rather than having a measured plan in place to achieve hiring targets.
We have a process – We can conduct a thorough review of the hiring needs required for scaling
Giving an unbiased view of your current team – We can see things that you cannot and can help identify key positions to be filled
Using our Rolodex – Recruiting specific players from our existing contacts and relationships to fill key posts
Getting your compensation scheme right – we can help create and implement a robust compensation program for your existing and potential C level executives
Evaluating leadership at add-on acquisitions – Due diligence of the C suite talent at potential acquisitions
Scaling the Business
When companies grow, they are increasing their revenue equally as fast as they are adding resources to enable that increase. When companies scale, on the other hand, they add revenue at a faster rate than they take on new costs. When establishing a scaling strategy for your business, you should have the following long-term goals in mind:
Standardizing your processes: Scaling requires you to move beyond the start-up phase and standardize workflows so that they’re able to cope with increased market demands. Leveraging technologies and full-suite solutions (i.e. QuickBooks) can help business owners grow their company while saving time and keeping upfront costs low.
Aside from automation, standardizing your business processes is another essential element of scaling. When you bring in new team leaders and middle managers, you must document and distribute a clear set of instructions to the personnel responsible for handling a certain activity. These instructions should be repeated regularly and will ultimately convert an otherwise complex task into a structured regimen. Whenever confusion arises within the team, they can refer to the process checklist rather than you.
Identifying core competencies: To operate at scale, business leaders need to concentrate on mastering the company’s core competencies. For example, in every company, there are daily or weekly tasks that generate more leads and greater revenue than others. These are the tasks that must be prioritized on your business’s schedule, as they are the ones that stimulate growth. Knowing how to scale a business begins with being able to identify where you offer the most value to clients and customers and aggressively ramping up those specific operations. We can offer a fresh perspective and key insights in this regard.
Leveraging equity: To execute your plan, you need funding to leverage and complement your equity capital. We have extensive experience in securing funding for small businesses, some that are standard, some that are new to the market – traditional term loans, short-term loans, business lines of credit, SBA loans, invoice financing, recurring revenue loans (based on MRR or ARR), etc.
Looking to scale your go-to-market effort?
Reach out and start a conversation with our team.
Last updated: July 30, 2021 This Privacy Policy describes Our policies and procedures on the collection, use and disclosure of Your information when You use the Service and tells You about Your privacy rights and how the law protects You.
We use Your Personal data to provide and improve the Service. By using the Service, You agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
The words of which the initial letter is capitalized have meanings defined under the following conditions. The following definitions shall have the same meaning regardless of whether they appear in singular or in plural.
For the purposes of this Privacy Policy:
While using Our Service, We may ask You to provide Us with certain personally identifiable information that can be used to contact or identify You. Personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to:
Usage Data is collected automatically when using the Service. Usage Data may include information such as Your Device’s Internet Protocol address (e.g. IP address), browser type, browser version, the pages of our Service that You visit, the time and date of Your visit, the time spent on those pages, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data. When You access the Service by or through a mobile device, We may collect certain information automatically, including, but not limited to, the type of mobile device You use, Your mobile device unique ID, the IP address of Your mobile device, Your mobile operating system, the type of mobile Internet browser You use, unique device identifiers and other diagnostic data. We may also collect information that Your browser sends whenever You visit our Service or when You access the Service by or through a mobile device.
We use Cookies and similar tracking technologies to track the activity on Our Service and store certain information. Tracking technologies used are beacons, tags, and scripts to collect and track information and to improve and analyze Our Service. The technologies We use may include:
Cookies can be “Persistent” or “Session” Cookies. Persistent Cookies remain on Your personal computer or mobile device when You go offline, while Session Cookies are deleted as soon as You close Your web browser. You can learn more about cookies here: All About Cookies by TermsFeed. We use both Session and Persistent Cookies for the purposes set out below:
For more information about the cookies we use and your choices regarding cookies, please visit our Cookies Policy or the Cookies section of our Privacy Policy.
The Company may use Personal Data for the following purposes:
We may share Your personal information in the following situations:
The Company will retain Your Personal Data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. We will retain and use Your Personal Data to the extent necessary to comply with our legal obligations (for example, if we are required to retain your data to comply with applicable laws), resolve disputes, and enforce our legal agreements and policies. The Company will also retain Usage Data for internal analysis purposes. Usage Data is generally retained for a shorter period of time, except when this data is used to strengthen the security or to improve the functionality of Our Service, or We are legally obligated to retain this data for longer time periods.
Your information, including Personal Data, is processed at the Company’s operating offices and in any other places where the parties involved in the processing are located. It means that this information may be transferred to — and maintained on — computers located outside of Your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the data protection laws may differ than those from Your jurisdiction. Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by Your submission of such information represents Your agreement to that transfer. The Company will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that Your data is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy and no transfer of Your Personal Data will take place to an organization or a country unless there are adequate controls in place including the security of Your data and other personal information.
If the Company is involved in a merger, acquisition or asset sale, Your Personal Data may be transferred. We will provide notice before Your Personal Data is transferred and becomes subject to a different Privacy Policy.
Under certain circumstances, the Company may be required to disclose Your Personal Data if required to do so by law or in response to valid requests by public authorities (e.g. a court or a government agency).
The Company may disclose Your Personal Data in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to:
The security of Your Personal Data is important to Us, but remember that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. While We strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect Your Personal Data, We cannot guarantee its absolute security.
Our Service does not address anyone under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 13. If You are a parent or guardian and You are aware that Your child has provided Us with Personal Data, please contact Us. If We become aware that We have collected Personal Data from anyone under the age of 13 without verification of parental consent, We take steps to remove that information from Our servers. If We need to rely on consent as a legal basis for processing Your information and Your country requires consent from a parent, We may require Your parent’s consent before We collect and use that information.
Our Service may contain links to other websites that are not operated by Us. If You click on a third party link, You will be directed to that third party’s site. We strongly advise You to review the Privacy Policy of every site You visit. We have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies or practices of any third party sites or services.
We may update Our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify You of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page. We will let You know via email and/or a prominent notice on Our Service, prior to the change becoming effective and update the “Last updated” date at the top of this Privacy Policy. You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, You can contact us:
.
Please read these terms and conditions carefully before using Our Service.
The words of which the initial letter is capitalized have meanings defined under the following conditions. The following definitions shall have the same meaning regardless of whether they appear in singular or in plural.
For the purposes of these Terms and Conditions:
These are the Terms and Conditions governing the use of this Service and the agreement that operates between You and the Company. These Terms and Conditions set out the rights and obligations of all users regarding the use of the Service.
Your access to and use of the Service is conditioned on Your acceptance of and compliance with these Terms and Conditions. These Terms and Conditions apply to all visitors, users and others who access or use the Service.
By accessing or using the Service You agree to be bound by these Terms and Conditions. If You disagree with any part of these Terms and Conditions then You may not access the Service.
You represent that you are over the age of 18. The Company does not permit those under 18 to use the Service.
Your access to and use of the Service is also conditioned on Your acceptance of and compliance with the Privacy Policy of the Company. Our Privacy Policy describes Our policies and procedures on the collection, use and disclosure of Your personal information when You use the Application or the Website and tells You about Your privacy rights and how the law protects You. Please read Our Privacy Policy carefully before using Our Service.
Our Service may contain links to third-party web sites or services that are not owned or controlled by the Company.
The Company has no control over, and assumes no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third party web sites or services. You further acknowledge and agree that the Company shall not be responsible or liable, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any such content, goods or services available on or through any such web sites or services.
We strongly advise You to read the terms and conditions and privacy policies of any third-party web sites or services that You visit.
We may terminate or suspend Your access immediately, without prior notice or liability, for any reason whatsoever, including without limitation if You breach these Terms and Conditions.
Upon termination, Your right to use the Service will cease immediately.
Notwithstanding any damages that You might incur, the entire liability of the Company and any of its suppliers under any provision of this Terms and Your exclusive remedy for all of the foregoing shall be limited to the amount actually paid by You through the Service or 100 USD if You haven’t purchased anything through the Service.
To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, in no event shall the Company or its suppliers be liable for any special, incidental, indirect, or consequential damages whatsoever (including, but not limited to, damages for loss of profits, loss of data or other information, for business interruption, for personal injury, loss of privacy arising out of or in any way related to the use of or inability to use the Service, third-party software and/or third-party hardware used with the Service, or otherwise in connection with any provision of this Terms), even if the Company or any supplier has been advised of the possibility of such damages and even if the remedy fails of its essential purpose.
Some states do not allow the exclusion of implied warranties or limitation of liability for incidental or consequential damages, which means that some of the above limitations may not apply. In these states, each party’s liability will be limited to the greatest extent permitted by law.
The Service is provided to You “AS IS” and “AS AVAILABLE” and with all faults and defects without warranty of any kind. To the maximum extent permitted under applicable law, the Company, on its own behalf and on behalf of its Affiliates and its and their respective licensors and service providers, expressly disclaims all warranties, whether express, implied, statutory or otherwise, with respect to the Service, including all implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title and non-infringement, and warranties that may arise out of course of dealing, course of performance, usage or trade practice. Without limitation to the foregoing, the Company provides no warranty or undertaking, and makes no representation of any kind that the Service will meet Your requirements, achieve any intended results, be compatible or work with any other software, applications, systems or services, operate without interruption, meet any performance or reliability standards or be error free or that any errors or defects can or will be corrected.
Without limiting the foregoing, neither the Company nor any of the company’s provider makes any representation or warranty of any kind, express or implied: (i) as to the operation or availability of the Service, or the information, content, and materials or products included thereon; (ii) that the Service will be uninterrupted or error-free; (iii) as to the accuracy, reliability, or currency of any information or content provided through the Service; or (iv) that the Service, its servers, the content, or e-mails sent from or on behalf of the Company are free of viruses, scripts, trojan horses, worms, malware, timebombs or other harmful components.
Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain types of warranties or limitations on applicable statutory rights of a consumer, so some or all of the above exclusions and limitations may not apply to You. But in such a case the exclusions and limitations set forth in this section shall be applied to the greatest extent enforceable under applicable law.
The laws of the Country, excluding its conflicts of law rules, shall govern this Terms and Your use of the Service. Your use of the Application may also be subject to other local, state, national, or international laws.
If You have any concern or dispute about the Service, You agree to first try to resolve the dispute informally by contacting the Company.
If You are a European Union consumer, you will benefit from any mandatory provisions of the law of the country in which you are resident in.
You represent and warrant that (i) You are not located in a country that is subject to the United States government embargo, or that has been designated by the United States government as a “terrorist supporting” country, and (ii) You are not listed on any United States government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
If any provision of these Terms is held to be unenforceable or invalid, such provision will be changed and interpreted to accomplish the objectives of such provision to the greatest extent possible under applicable law and the remaining provisions will continue in full force and effect.
Except as provided herein, the failure to exercise a right or to require performance of an obligation under this Terms shall not effect a party’s ability to exercise such right or require such performance at any time thereafter nor shall be the waiver of a breach constitute a waiver of any subsequent breach.
These Terms and Conditions may have been translated if We have made them available to You on our Service. You agree that the original English text shall prevail in the case of a dispute.
We reserve the right, at Our sole discretion, to modify or replace these Terms at any time. If a revision is material We will make reasonable efforts to provide at least 30 days’ notice prior to any new terms taking effect. What constitutes a material change will be determined at Our sole discretion.
By continuing to access or use Our Service after those revisions become effective, You agree to be bound by the revised terms. If You do not agree to the new terms, in whole or in part, please stop using the website and the Service.
If you have any questions about these Terms and Conditions, You can contact us: team@batterypointcapital.co