Experience and Expertise

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With over 25 years of experience in leading organizations through complex business challenges, we are able to bring a deep skill set focused on creating value.  Our experience includes multiple mergers and acquisitions, divestitures and C-Suite leadership for organizations experiencing substantial organic and inorganic growth, operational difficulties, cash flow constraints and ownership transitions.

Our track record of creating over $2 billion in equity value is driven by our ability to balance the needs of ownership and the organization while collectively improving operating results, cash flow and equity value.

While serving as the sitting CFO of Metaldyne, a $1B private equity owned company, our founder was a key team member in transforming the organization into a $3B publicly traded global automotive supplier.  

In 2014, Metaldyne was combined with two other $1B automotive suppliers to form Metaldyne Performance Group (NYSE: MPG).  Upon merger, the combined entity went through a series of transactions, including the refinancing of existing debt, an initial public offering and ultimately the sale of the company to a strategic partner in American Axle (NYSE: AXL).

During this transformation, our founder was instrumental in transitioning the three businesses into a single combined company and ultimately positioning the business for sale through common sense, pragmatic leadership.  The MPG shareholders saw a significant return on their investment in under five years despite challenging market conditions.

During his tenure at MPG, Metaldyne, UCI and Axletech, our founder was focused on ensuring that the company's strategic direction was aligned with value creation, making each company an attractive acquisition for financial and strategic investors.  This focus begins with identifying the strengths of the business and leveraging them for growth and returns.  

Having completed several successful ownership transitions, Mr. Blaufuss possesses a unique, highly valuable skill of positioning businesses for sale and then assisting on the execution of the transaction.

As an ownership transition event becomes visible, Mark has demonstrated tremendous capabilities to lead the sale process, working with all aspects of due diligence, contract negotiation and maintaining organizational focus.  

During each of company's ownership transition, several challenges emerged ranging from the financial crisis in late 2008, the emerging power of key customers and the market concerns of "peak cycle".  Each of the challenges was successfully negotiated and resulted in significant equity returns.

A key aspect of many organizations inorganic growth or investment strategy is to acquire businesses.  Much of the due diligence burden falls on consultants who, in many cases, haven't held positions within operating companies nor will be an integral part of the post acquisition integration and running of the company.

A key part of diligence is understanding the past and current risks being inherited.  Those areas of diligence are clearly important to assessing value and the condition of the business.  Equally as important is assessing the capabilities of the organization to realize their growth plans and execute on operational improvements.  

Having been involved in numerous acquisitions as both a consultant and sitting CFO, our founder brings an added strength to the acquisition process by focusing on both the state of the business being acquired and the opportunities it will bring under new ownership.

In several engagements and acquisition processes, we have revealed material concerns surrounding the targeted business through a regiment of prudent questions, observations and overall business understanding.  Equipped with this insight, acquisition valuations can be properly adjusted, integration plans more fully clarified and prioritized actions determined, all leading to an acquisition that meets or exceeds expectations.

Far too often, organizations become stagnant over time, losing strategic focus and innovative thinking.  With the depth of Mr. Blaufuss' experience in several different size and types of organizations, he has developed a strong skill set of "seeing the big picture" through the application of common sense.

For example, many companies utilize key production indicators or "KPI's" to run their organizations.  However, these KPI's are often too extensive or not the true performance drivers in the business.  Operational leadership meetings become cluttered with too much of the wrong data and not enough of the key business drivers.  As a result, organizational performance drops and management usually defaults to a "work harder" mentality when working smarter is the key.

A pragmatic approach is needed to assess the true drivers of the business and then reliable data is required to address the business real time.  This requires an independent, non-biased view with experience in multiple organizations and varying systems and management structures.

With our founders experience in multiple businesses with a wide range of management structures, he is able to assess the key performance drivers of the business and help to build a management operating system that will help deliver stronger results.  

Bringing this unbiased, common sense approach to management, backed by data based KPI's inevitably helps organizations truly assess performance and improve results.

Our founder is currently serving on two boards and chairing both audit committees.  In these roles, he is  providing strategic insight and direction for both organizations.  In addition to providing board level insight, he is also providing support for the finance organizations and specifically the CFO's.  These roles are focused on representing the shareholders best interest while bringing over 20 years of CFO experience to the companies to help growth in both revenue and earnings, as well as position the business for the highest possible equity returns.