MBF Group · Established 2009
Mid-market M&A, led by the partners who pitch it.
A boutique investment bank running disciplined sell-side, buy-side, and recapitalization processes for founder-led and PE-backed operators between $20M and $500M of EBITDA — at founder speed, with bulge-bracket discipline.
Request a Confidential ConsultationNEW YORK · CHICAGO · FRANKFURT
A thesis, not a tagline
The mid-market deal doesn't close because of headcount. It closes because of attention.
At $186 million of average enterprise value, a transaction is rarely a complexity problem. It is an attention problem. The managing director who knows the buyer's CFO by name will hear the objections first; the analyst buried in a staffing pyramid will hear them last. The largest banks sell scale. We sell the opposite: senior hours, decisively deployed, through a four-stage process engineered to sign in 4.7 months — 38% faster than the comparable bulge-bracket benchmark.
MBF Group was built for the founder who suspects their advisor will over-engineer the process, and for the private-equity principal who has watched a flagship mandate quietly drift inside a large bank's resource model. We do not layer. Eighty-seven percent of deal hours on every mandate are billed by directors or partners. The pitch team is the deal team is the negotiation team.
— The partners, MBF Group
By the numbers
Fifteen years of mandates, counted honestly.
- 140+ Closed mid-market transactions since 2009, across eleven industries.
- 4.7 mo Average time from mandate to signed documentation.
- 92% Close rate on accepted mandates over the last five fiscal years, against a ~55% industry average.
- #7 2024 Refinitiv Mid-Market M&A League Tables, deals between $50M and $500M.
Twenty-two transactions closed in 2024 with aggregate deal value exceeding $3.1B.
Practice areas
Three advisory practices. One senior-led process.
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01
Sell-side advisory
For founders, family owners, and PE-backed boards exploring a full or partial divestiture. We run competitive processes against 2,300+ qualified buyer introductions sourced from the proprietary MBF Buyer Atlas, manage CIM preparation and management presentations, and lead negotiation through to a signed purchase agreement and a coordinated close.
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02
Buy-side advisory
For strategic acquirers and financial sponsors pursuing platform or bolt-on acquisitions. We build the target universe, screen against thesis criteria, run confidential outreach, model transaction and synergy cases, and lead diligence and negotiation through definitive agreement.
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03
Recapitalizations & strategic alternatives
For operators weighing a minority recapitalization, continuation vehicle, growth-equity raise, or generational transition. We structure and execute the right instrument — debt, minority equity, or a sale — and negotiate against the universe most likely to clear at the right valuation.
The MBF process
Four chapters. 4.7 months, on average.
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Chapter I
Mandate & preparation
Three to six weeks of positioning work: a defensible valuation framework, a confidential information memorandum, a tiered buyer universe of 47,000+ screened strategics and financials, and a fully drafted process timeline. Every deliverable is built in-house by the same team that will run the market.
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Chapter II
Market outreach & first-round bids
Targeted outreach to the buyer universe under NDA; curated management presentations; structured indication-of-interest analysis that surfaces pricing, certainty of funds, and cultural fit before we descend into the second round.
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Chapter III
Diligence & negotiation
Coordinated confirmatory diligence across financial, commercial, legal, and tax workstreams; live negotiation of the term sheet and then the purchase agreement. We sit at the table with you — the managing director, not a coverage banker dropped from a remote office.
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Chapter IV
Signing & close
Sign, announce, and close. We coordinate regulatory and third-party consents, manage the post-signing workplan, and stay engaged through the final funding so that signed holds.
Recent mandates, anonymized for confidentiality
Representative engagements.
The following are illustrative transactions drawn from closed and recently concluded mandates. Names, sectors, and figures are generalized to protect confidentiality.
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Industrial specialty manufacturer
Sold a family-owned manufacturer of precision components serving aerospace and defense end-markets to a strategic acquirer seeking a North American platform. Enterprise value in the $210M range; process completed in four and a half months against a competing bulge-bracket mandate that did not advance past the second round.
- Aerospace & Defense
- Founder-led
- ~$210M EV
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Health-services software platform
Recapitalized a PE-backed SaaS business serving mid-sized clinical-practice networks via a minority growth equity round led by a top-quartile sector fund, providing partial liquidity to founders and meaningful capital for product expansion. Transaction closed in five months from engagement to signing.
- Software & Tech
- PE-backed
- Minority recap
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Consumer-products strategic acquisition
Advised a publicly listed European consumer-products company on the acquisition of a U.S. heritage brand generating $48M of adjusted EBITDA, including target identification across more than two hundred brands, confidential outreach, diligence coordination, and purchase-price negotiation through definitive agreement.
- Consumer & Retail
- Strategic buyer
- Cross-border