Private Equity Funcast

As a follow-up to Devin's (surprisingly) popular PEHUB column from early August, Devin and Jim expound on the lingo inside a PE firm.  This isn't sports talk or girl talk, this is private equity talk and it makes about as much sense as some of the wild stories in the Raymond Carver book we stole our title from.  Sit back and enjoy, and just like an after school special starring Robbie Benson, there just might even be a lesson or two to learn in between all the laughing (or is that crying?).

Devin and Jim talk about Satya Nadella's public strategy letter on the future of Microsoft aka "Bold Ambition & Our Core".    How does this apply to the middle market?  Should middle market companies be avoiding commitments to the Microsoft platform? 

Jim sits down with Evan Delaney to talk about Apple's new Swift programming language, the pros the cons -- and whether companies should be jumping into the deep end of the pool and going whole-hog with Swift.

Jim sits down with Evan Delaney to talk about approaches you can use for building your mobile applications on the Apple platform.  Although we do get a little technical in spots, this episode is for the CEO, not the CTO.

Devin and Jim sit down with Northwestern Kellogg School of Management Professor Michael Mazzeo to discuss his upcoming book: Roadside MBA: Back Road Lessons for Entrepreneurs, Executives and Small Business Owners.  Today we talk about the human side of the business -- hiring your team.

A Series of PE Haikus for the sophisticated listener.  A light-hearted conversation with Matthew Craig-Greene of Pivot Partners Ltd -- our Thursday gift from us, to you!  

Devin and Jim sit down with Northwestern Kellogg School of Management Professor Michael Mazzeo to discuss his upcoming book: Roadside MBA: Back Road Lessons for Entrepreneurs, Executives and Small Business Owners.   In this second episode with Professor Mazzeo we discuss product differentiation and price.

Devin and Jim sit down with Northwestern Kellogg School of Management Professor Michael Mazzeo to discuss his upcoming book: Roadside MBA: Back Road Lessons for Entrepreneurs, Executives and Small Business Owners.  

Devin and Uber-Associate Kevin Fitzgerald sit down with Steve Julius, PhD aka "Dr. J" to talk about organizational behavior and team dynamics.   Dr. Julius opines on human behavior, organizational dynamics and business development.  Listen in and get insight on creating practical strategies and easy-to-use tools for resolving a wide range of business and human resource needs. 

We sit down with a real life Associate from a real life private equity fund. Removed from his natural habitat and placed in captivity in Chicago, Kevin Fitzgerald shares with us what he did to get the job, what he does on a daily basis and where he's taking the experience next (hint: it's in Cambridge, MA).

The FunCast spends an hour with "Must React" sales system founder Kraig Kleeman.   Everything that you need to know about persuasion, sales transformation and sales enablement.  Plus, you get to hear Kraig's story about meeting U2's Bono.

The FunCast spends an hour with Macworld writer and podcast impresario Lex Friedman from The Midroll -- home of 130+ podcasts.   Everything that you need to know about advertising on podcasts including listener demographics and getting started.

The FunCast spends another hour with McDermott Will & Emery LLP Partner Ryan Harris breaking down an actual private equity letter of intent.  We go term by term with one of the best transaction lawyers in the business.  Founders will learn all the tricks of the trade to even the playing field in their negotiation.  Devin says "You are welcome".

Jim and Devin discuss the vaunted venture "pivot" and its applicability, or lack there-of in the private equity business.

Jim trades programming barbs, tips and opinions with the guru of application development, Alan Williamson.

Devin and Jim don't follow college basketball, but they have cooked up their own version of March Madness. 

Bring out your debt!  We've talked a lot about funding options for owners of mid sized companies but we haven't covered debt yet.  Well, here you go.  A detailed conversation with Ian Larkin, founder and Managing Partner of Maranon Capital.  Ian describes why you should look at debt in a business like a parfait sundae (seriously, he does!) and what all those layers mean to you as an owner.  He talks about the aversion most business owners have toward debt and why they might want to change their minds a little.  Then at the end we kind of ramble on about things that have nothing to do with debt, private equity or fancy deserts.

Interview with Dirk Shimpach, President of goVirtualOffice -- a "NetSuite Solution provider and cloud technology advisor that helps companies find the Cloud CRM, Cloud ERP and Cloud Accounting software".  Dirk and his team have worked with a number of our portfolio companies on configuring NetSuite to match our business needs.   In this interview we talk about the best fits for NetSuite and things to watch out for when you are selecting and implementing cloud-based ERP solutions.

The FunCast spends an hour with McDermott Will & Emery LLP Partner Ryan Harris talking about the legal traps founders fall into when setting up their companies and when they sell them. What's the best company structure -- C Corp, S Corp, LLC?  How do you handle employee equity?  Hear about the infamous "Cubs side letter."  What are the common issues Ryan sees when founders go to sell their business and how can you avoid them? Listening to this conversation won't make you stronger, but it sure will make you smarter!  Enjoy.

Microsoft isn't going away soon as an enterprise server and platform vendor.  So there's little risk in building your server platform on Microsoft in the middle market.   It's important to build client interfaces that span browsers and mobile platforms, but the server layer is reliable and safe.   Nadella is a good choice to move Microsoft more aggressively into the cloud with Azure -- and they've got plenty of money to do it.   Congrats to the WhatsApp team and Sequoia on the sale to Facebook.  There are some lessons to be learned here in the middle market.