Rotunda Capital Partners Named for Third Consecutive Year in Inc.’s 2022 List of Founder-Friendly Investors
Annual roundup highlights the private equity and venture capital firms with established track records of success backing entrepreneurs
BETHESDA, Md. and EVANSTON, Ill. – Rotunda Capital Partners ("Rotunda"), an operationally focused, lower middle-market private equity investment firm, has, once again, earned a place on Inc.’s recently announced Founder-Friendly Investors list. The list honors 184 private equity and venture capital firms that entrepreneurs collaborate with and trust as they receive the financial support they need to drive growth.
Since inception, Rotunda has only invested in family/founder-owned firms to transform them into data-driven growth platforms, helping to expand their businesses organically and through acquisitions, while preserving the company’s culture established by its founder.
“Rotunda’s inclusion in Inc.’s Founder-Friendly Investors list for a third consecutive year is a testament to our three-pronged approach to building better businesses: thematic sourcing, strategy mapping, and data and analytics,” said John Fruehwirth, managing partner of Rotunda. “This approach—combined with great family/founder owned businesses that share our core values of partnership, integrity, transparency and excellence—is proving to be replicable, flexible, and highly effective.”
Since the start of 2022, Rotunda has made three platform investments and completed thirteen add-on acquisitions across its portfolio. Each business was founder or family-owned at the time of Rotunda’s investment.
One notable partnership was formed in November 2022, with US Waterproofing (“USWP”). At the time, Matt Stock, CEO, commented: “I am very excited to partner with Rotunda to help USWP achieve significant organic and acquisition growth. Their dedicated focus of partnering with family-founder companies to achieve significant growth while retaining our culture is compelling to me.”
To compile the list, Inc. went straight to the source: entrepreneurs who have sold to private equity and venture capital firms. Founders filled out a questionnaire about their experiences partnering with private equity and venture capital firms and shared data on how their portfolio companies have grown during these partnerships.
“Fully investing in an entrepreneur, and their innovative vision, involves far more than the financial investment. By developing relationships with and supporting entrepreneurs for the long-term, these private equity firms are more than investors, they’re partners,” said Scott Omelianuk, editor-in-chief of Inc. media.
About Rotunda Capital Partners
Rotunda Capital Partners is an operationally oriented private equity firm focused on transforming family-founder owned companies into dynamic, data-driven platforms able to achieve and manage significant growth. Since its founding in 2009, Rotunda has partnered with management teams to build great businesses within three primary sectors: value-added distribution, asset-light logistics and industrial & business services. Rotunda strives to achieve replicable results by implementing its Rotunda Performance System to create strategic alignment, develop lean processes and create robust, data-driven infrastructures. For more information, visit www.rotundacapital.com.
Past performance is no guarantee of future results, while all investments are subject to loss.
Any subjective views or opinions expressed herein should not be construed as absolute statements and are subject to change without notice to you. No representation, express or implied, is given regarding the accuracy of the information contained herein. Any forward-looking statements included herein are based on Rotunda Capital Partners’ current opinions, assumptions, expectations, beliefs, intentions, regarding future events, are subject to risks and uncertainties, and are provided for informational purposes only.
Rotunda Capital Partners submitted an application and paid an application fee to be considered for this list, which was issued on October 4th, 2022 and covers the period of April 2021 to April 2022. This list is based on an analysis of information gathered by Inc. Magazine using its own methodologies and criteria, which analysis relies in part on certain subjective determinations and is subject to inherent limitations.