Sold to Strategic Partner | Itai Ben-Gal

E3: On today's episode we hear from Rick Marini. Rick is a serial entrepreneur with 25 years of operating and investing experience in the technology space. He founded and successfully sold 3 companies (Tickle, BranchOut and Talk.co). He is an active angel investor in 50 tech start-ups including 17 unicorns (including Snapchat, Reddit, Opendoor, and AngelList). In 2018, Rick was named a "Top 50 Angel Investor" by Forbes.

Rick is also the Co-founder & Managing Partner of Catapult Capital - a private equity firm that focuses on transactions in the Internet, advertising, media, consumer and broader technology sectors. Full buyouts include Grindr and JibJab. Rick currently serves as the COO of Grindr and on the Board of Directors for JibJab.

Rick was the Founder & CEO of BranchOut, the largest professional network leveraging the social graph with more than 800 million professional profiles. BranchOut raised $49 million in funding from Accel, Redpoint, Mayfield, Norwest and Floodgate. In 2014, BranchOut was acquired by a publicly-traded recruiting company.

Rick was Founder & CEO of Talk.co, an enterprise messaging app. In 2014, Talk.co was acquired by Hearst Corporation. Rick ran the Digital Innovation Group at Hearst from 2014-2016.

In 1999, Rick co-founded Tickle.com, one of the largest social media sites on the Internet. In 2002, Tickle won the “Rising Star” Webby Award as the fastest growing site on the Web. Tickle grew to more than 200 million registered users and was a top 20 Internet site. In 2004, Monster Worldwide acquired Tickle for $100 million.

Beyond Rick's depth of knowledge and experience, he is an amazing human being - he generously gives his time to coach and mentor early-stage companies and is a huge advocate for new founders looking for advice, support, and investment in Silicon Valley.

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This episode is brought to you by Exitwise: https://www.exitwise.com

Exitwise helps business owners create the exits they deserve by assembling the best teams of industry specific, M&A experts, who will help maximize the sale of each business.

How Does It Work:

1. Schedule A Call: Schedule a call with one of our M&A Advisors and we'll walk you through the entire process of selling your business, from market valuations to M&A expert fees and from due diligence to the signing of your purchase agreement. We're here to answer any questions you may have.

On this call, we'll want to learn about the history of the business, your financial performance, your management team and listen to your thoughts and requirements for selling the business so we can make sure to find the best M&A experts to help maximize your exit.

2. Review Top Experts: Once we've had a chance to process all your business information, we'll share with you, our top choices for investment bankers, M&A attorneys, and tax accountants to help maximize the sale of your business.

We’ll present each M&A expert’s transaction history, estimated valuation range for your business and their fee structures. Then we’ll talk through the pros and cons of each choice to help you prioritize and make the best decisions.

3. Negotiate & Hire: Finally, when we've narrowed it down to your top choices, we'll negotiate your engagement letter with each M&A expert to make sure fees and terms are fair for everyone. We know what to look for and we know how to keep everyone incentivized for your optimal outcome.

Once your M&A experts have been selected and you’re ready to move forward, we’ll collect signatures and get everyone to work.