The Albany Gazette - Bankers Edge Advisory Launches Buy-Side M&A Practice for Lower Middle Market Platform Builders

BIRMINGHAM, MI / ACCESS Newswire / July 13, 2026 / Bankers Edge Advisory today announced the launch of a dedicated buy-side M&A advisory practice serving private equity firms, family offices, independent sponsors, search funds, and acquisitive companies across the lower middle market - with a particular focus on platform creation and buy-and-build strategies. The practice pairs a dedicated deal-origination engine with the firm's established capital markets, structuring, and transaction-execution capabilities, giving them a single advisor from the first acquisition through full build-out.

Buyers in the lower middle market have long had to assemble their deal teams piece by piece: search in one place, platform strategy and thesis in another, capital in a third, and execution somewhere else entirely. Bankers Edge built the practice to consolidate that fragmented chain into one coordinated mandate - disciplined origination, senior-led structuring and capital formation, and execution through close, all under a single accountable advisor. The hardest piece to consolidate is capital: too often the partner a sponsor secures for the initial platform funds the deal in front of them, not the platform they set out to build - the next three add-ons that deal was meant to anchor. The result is a hamster wheel of never-ending raises, renegotiated at every turn, adding friction and slowing the build-out. That is what Bankers Edge solves - lining up a capital partner prepared to back the full build, from the first acquisition to the last, not one deal at a time.

"Most advisors help you buy a company. We help you build a platform - sourcing the next add-on, securing a capital partner who backs the whole thesis instead of the deal in front of them, and closing each acquisition. So the build never has to stop to go raise money again."
- Richard Consul, CFA, Founder & Managing Partner, Bankers Edge Advisory

PLATFORM STRATEGIES

A central focus of the practice is platform building. Bankers Edge works with private equity sponsors and family offices to identify anchor companies in fragmented industries, source and execute the add-on acquisitions that scale them, and - critically - secure a capital partner prepared to fund the entire build rather than a single deal. The firm also helps form platforms from the ground up: validating the investment thesis, sourcing the initial businesses, securing aligned capital, and supporting the leadership teams brought in to run them.

"In a buy-and-build you don't raise capital once - you raise it again and again, and most capital partners only commit to the deal in front of them. We pair origination with a capital partner aligned to the entire build, so a sponsor can scale a roll-up without re-running the raise on every add-on."
- Mitch Vermet, CFA, CAIA, Managing Partner, Bankers Edge Advisory

IN PRACTICE

Financing an add-on on the eve of an exit - and clearing the path to close

A private equity sponsor that had spent several years building a platform was preparing to exit through an auction, with a sell-side advisor already engaged. Mid-process, an attractive add-on came available at a multiple well below the platform's expected auction multiple - clearly accretive, but awkward to finance, since the capital might be deployed for only a few months before the platform changed hands.

Bankers Edge sourced a capital partner willing to back exactly that situation. The financing funded the initial acquisition with $47 million and carried a $10 million delayed-draw term loan (DDTL) - giving the sponsor capacity to fund a further add-on, without contributing additional equity, so long as the platform stayed within agreed leverage multiples. The same partner then provided staple financing for the platform, so prospective buyers had immediate visibility into a live-market leverage read - removing a major diligence unknown and helping expedite the sale to close.

The result: an accretive acquisition the sponsor could not have financed on that timeline through a conventional lender, and a cleaner, faster path to exit.

Representative engagement; certain details modified for confidentiality.

At the center of the practice is a dedicated outreach and origination engine operating under the Bankers Edge brand, built to generate direct, qualified conversations with acquisition targets on behalf of clients. To lead origination, the firm has named Kevin Hong - founder of demand-generation and deal-sourcing firm Caprae Capital - as a Strategic Adviser to the practice.

"The hardest part of any acquisition is getting in front of the right owner before anyone else does - and in a buy-and-build, you have to do it again and again. Pairing a disciplined origination process with a team that can actually structure and close gives platform builders a real advantage in a crowded market."
- Kevin Hong, Strategic Adviser, Bankers Edge Advisory

Bankers Edge brings more than 30 years of combined capital markets and advisory experience, a CFA-led senior team, and a track record spanning debt advisory, equity capital markets, private placements, and M&A - with an average transaction size of approximately $37 million. The new practice extends that institutional discipline to the buy side, where platform builders have historically had to choose between origination specialists and execution advisors rather than engaging one team for both.

The launch arrives as buy-and-build has become a defining value-creation strategy in the lower middle market, with sponsors racing to consolidate fragmented industries one add-on at a time. Bankers Edge believes today's platform builders need more than traditional advisory support - they need origination, capital strategy, and execution working as one.

ABOUT BANKERS EDGE ADVISORY

Bankers Edge Advisory is a capital markets and M&A advisory firm serving private equity sponsors, family offices, financial institutions, and business owners across the lower middle market. The firm provides buy-side M&A advisory, debt and equity capital markets solutions, loan portfolio solutions, private placements, and strategic advisory. Securities are offered through BA Securities, LLC, Member FINRA/SIPC. Bankers Edge Advisory, LLC and BA Securities, LLC are separate, unaffiliated entities.

MEDIA CONTACT
Bankers Edge Advisory
Richard Consul, CFA · Founder & Managing Partner
[email protected] | (248) 953-5163
bankersedgeadvisory.com

SOURCE: Bankers Edge Advisory

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(A.Thompson--TAG)