2021 Year in Review: The RLH Perspective
While there were many news stories in the past year about the hot market for SPACs (special purpose acquisition companies), RLH’s news feed for 2021 gave that acronym a very different meaning:
S – Selling our interest in ClearView Healthcare Partners P – Partnering with three new portfolio companies and their management teams A – Adding three talented members to the RLH team C – Creating many new jobs in our portfolio
Here are the details behind those headlines…
We divested our interest in ClearView Healthcare Partners after a highly successful collaboration during which the company grew its revenue three-fold organically while concurrently earning numerous recognitions for the strength of its culture. ClearView provides high-value guidance to its pharma and medtech clients in connection with (i) key decision points in the development and commercialization process and (ii) the management of growth and innovation across clients’ entire clinical and commercial portfolios. ClearView earned a spot in Vault’s prestigious annual Top 50 Consulting Firms and Best Boutique Firms lists every year during RLH’s engagement with the Company and earned #1 Best Boutique honors in 2020. We congratulate the Company’s founders Rich Mynahan, Steve Chao, and Kevin Richard and the entire ClearView organization on their achievements and wish the Company continued success in the future.
We welcomed three new members to our family of portfolio companies.
Astound Commerce, a leading global provider of solutions that help enterprises grow revenue by enhancing their online relationships with consumers. From 25 offices across North America, Europe, and the Middle East, Astound’s more than 1,000 team members serve a diverse roster of blue-chip clients including Allergan, Oakley, Puma, and Under Armour. Astound develops personalized digital consumer experiences for its clients by combining broad-based technology expertise in key ecommerce software platforms together with creative talent.
imre, a growing provider of digitally-focused strategic and creative marketing services to enterprise clients in two sectors: (i) life sciences / healthcare and (ii) consumer products / services. The Company’s integrated suite of solutions includes brand strategy, creative, digital marketing, social media, and public relations, together with data & analytics. More than 220 talented imre professionals serve some of the world’s leading and high-growth brands including AstraZeneca, Pfizer, and GSK in healthcare and the National Football League, Infiniti, and Dickies in consumer products / services.
Keystone Strategy, an innovative consulting firm known for advising large enterprises and governmental agencies on critical strategic and regulatory challenges. Keystone combines expertise in business strategy, economics, and technology to develop novel approaches to understanding and responding to competitive dynamics and consumer behavior in large, fast-changing technology markets. Keystone has built a culture that has earned the Company coveted recognition on Vault’s list of the Top 50 Consulting Firms in each of the past two years.
We added three talented investment professionals to the RLH team. We are proud and pleased to welcome Mark Gartner (as a Principal, leading our Investment Development efforts), Madeline Ganey (as an Associate), and Paul Fortin (as an Associate) to our roster. They bring broad experience and perspectives that will undoubtedly make us better investors.
Our portfolio companies collectively added 1,050 new jobs in 2021, increasing their total employment by more than 20%. Our companies’ emphasis on the importance of business culture paid off, notwithstanding the Great Resignation and the shortage of talent for many knowledge worker positions.
And there’s more… RLH earned recognition on Inc. Magazine’s 2021 Founder-Friendly Investors list, which highlights investors “that business owners can trust and with whom they can constructively collaborate while receiving the financial support they need to accelerate growth”.
Also, RLH was named one of 2021’s Top 50 PE Firms in the Middle Market™ by Grady Campbell. This is the second consecutive year that RLH has earned this honor, which recognizes private equity firms that demonstrate excellent leadership, a strong track record, and a trusted reputation with business owners. We look forward to welcoming more middle-market firms into our portfolio in 2022 and invite your referrals of entrepreneurial management teams that are building market-leading, high-growth, knowledge-based profitable businesses in the $30 – 150 million revenue range within the sectors of business services, healthcare, and government services. On behalf of the entire RLH team, we hope that 2022 is a good year for you and all the people who make your business endeavors successful!