Our team of industry leaders take pride in
delivering exceptional results and maximizing value for our clients.

Across cultures and civilizations lions have been a symbol of majestic strength, power, great courage, strength of character, and fidelity. Lions are known for their visionary ability to assess opportunities and aggresssively pursue their goals with great success. They are amazing hunters as part of a pride working as a strategic alliance . Lions work together as a team focusing in on their intended targets with relentless pursuit and coordinated efforts towards their goals. Lions are known for their ability to deliver results with remarkable precision. It was an ancient belief that lions slept with their eyes open and are symbolic of watchfulness and protectiveness.

At Capital Partners, Investment Banking Group we have the strength, power, courage, character and fidelity to deliver extraordinary results and maximize results for our clients. We take great pride in meeting and exceeding your expectations.

Professional Team

John Rooney, Managing Partner

Michael Becker

Donia Newman, Partner

Joe Coulombe — Advisor

Mo Hayat

Dr. Helena Yli Renko

Rick Andrade

Don Kim

Clark Collins

Ron Glickman

Mark Gilbertson

Jane Applegate

Shad A. Mishu

Our Team Bios:

John Rooney - Managing Partner at Capital Partners, a middle market financial advisory group specializing in capital raises, private equity, sell and buy side advisory, special situations and restructuring.

Mr. Rooney brings over twenty five years of experience in capital advisory/financing, sell side, buy side, financial restructuring, and turnaround operations management for middle market companies. Mr. Rooney has provided advisory services to companies ranging in size from major corporations to middle market and small companies. John has personally been involved in hundreds of middle market companies during his career.

Mr. Rooney is formally Partner with Vision venture partners, a middle market investment bank specializing in financial advisory & sell side advisory services for middle market ready companies including a major pet company and a food/fruit distribution company.

Chairman and CEO of MailMark Direct Marketing which provided customer relationship management for national clients including: Sears, Jiffylube, Pepboys, Teleflora, Shell Oil, 1-800 Dentist, Valvoline, and thousands of other businesses processing 45 million data records weekly. John led the effort to restructure the business, grow revenue, and EBIDTA earnings and facilitated the sale to a private media company.

President and CEO, publicly traded frozen food manufacturer for Claim Jumpers, Milton’s Costco, Safeway, Ralphs, and many other well known food companies. In a two year period, John successfully restructured the company from negative earnings to profitability and facilitated the sale to an international private equity group.

President and CEO of a major Business Development Corporation for twelve years. John expanded the organization offices which assisted thousands of companies with, capital raises, restructuring, financing, buy-sell advisory entrepreneurial training, and management consulting. The U.S. Department of Commerce awarded the organization as the “best economic development program” in the western United States.

Chairman, breakthrough partners – Mr. Rooney led a group of dozens of high-growth companies in collaboration with Merrill Lynch successfully leading the efforts to expand these companies significantly.

Mr. Rooney has been quoted and featured in many major newspapers, television, radio and business magazines nationally and internationally as one of the country’s prominent middle market company experts. John was awarded the “Good Guy” award by the National woman's political caucus for his work with women owned business.

Faculty Member USC’s Marshall School of Business in the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, The program has consistently ranked among the top programs in the nation and has been ranked #1 by Princeton Review and Entrepreneur Magazine. Business Week with U.S. News and World Report labeled the program as "one of the best Entrepreneurship programs" in the country

Mr. Rooney holds a BS in Entrepreneurship from the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business, an executive degree in real estate development and an MBA from the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business where he graduated with national honors.

Michael Becker
Michael is Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Broadsword Partners, LLP (BP), a best of breed, multi-disciplinary merchant banking firm in New York City that offers services to the middle market business community ranging from financial advisory and consulting to principal investing. 

BP mission is to help expand the business and increase the market value of client and portfolio companies. BP acts in an advisory and consultative role to analyze, evaluate, structure, and finance an organization's optimal strategic alternatives in a broad range of industries to maximize value. BP also invests on a private equity basis in early and middle stage companies utilizing its own capital. BP has led investments in several early stage and established companies and advised sell side and buy side clients in various types of capital structure events. Although BP operates in a variety of industry verticals, aviation/aerospace, military/defense/law enforcement suppliers, healthcare, consumer products, materials and industrial areas are preferred industry sectors. The firms website is: www.bpny.com.

Donia Newman
Donia Newman is a Partner at Capital Partners. She brings over twenty years experience working with clients to meet their individualized goals.  Donia has worked with corporate clients in private consultation and has been a featured presenter at leadership seminars.  She has taught at the graduate level as well.

She is currently a doctoral candidate having completed the coursework towards her doctorate in Organizational Leadership. She has also attained two master’s degrees one in Administration and the other in Clinical Psychology both degrees from Pepperdine University. Donia has a bachelor’s degree with a double major in Education and a minor in Psychology.

Joe Coulumbe — Advisor
Joe contributes over 45 years experience in the retail grocery, consumer products, and management consulting to the Capital Partners Investment Banking Advisory Board. Mr. Coulumbe founded Trader Joe’s in 1958 as a chain of convenience stores called “Pronto Markets” in the Los Angeles area. Joe had a vision to grow the chain and expand the store offerings and enhance their image. As a result, Joe sold Trader Joe’s in 1979 to the German owned Aldi supermarket chain. Joe continued to build the chain under the new ownership and retired in 1989.

Trader Joe’s has expanded to over 200 stores in 18 states including Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oregon, and Pennsylvania.

Joe hasn’t retired his energy yet. Mr. Coulumbe still serves on the boards of several companies including Cost Plus World Market and True Religion Apparel. Joe holds an MBA from Stanford Business.

“Mo” Hayat
Prior to joining Capital Partners, Mo was an Associate at Latham and Watkins, LLP, a premier global law firm. While at Latham, Mo worked on an incredible breadth of cutting edge and complex transactions in capital markets, finance, corporate, land use and real estate. His clients included large investment banks, developers, Fortune 100 clients and startups. Mo is also the founder of MoRa Partners, Inc., a real estate investment, brokerage and development firm.

Mo received his Juris Doctorate in 2001 from Boat Hall School of Law, University of California, Berkeley and graduated cum laude with a Bachelors of Science in Bio-Chemistry in 1997 from Pepperdine University. While at Pepperdine, Mo helped launch Amazing Taste Foods, Inc., a startup based in Malibu, CA. Mo participated in all facets of the company including performing research and development of new products, preparing and implementing marketing and sales programs, installing manufacturing and distribution processes, implementing office systems, technology and processes and managing customer and vendor relationships. Mo helped the company grow from a mere idea to having a presence in markets nationwide.

Mo is adept at recognizing business, legal, marketing, public relations and financial issues and opportunities, as well as able to quickly and decisively respond to such issues and capitalize on such opportunities. Mo is an experienced negotiator and has a calm demeanor and a creative and enterprising personality.

Dr. Helena Yli Renko
Dr. Yli Renko is an international renown “Strategic Management” consultant. Prior to joining the USC faculty in 2003, Dr. Yli Renko worked as Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company where she led teams focusing on a variety of strategic, marketing, and organizational issues. Dr. Renko’s strategic consulting has assisted some of the world’s most efficient Fortune 500 companies.

Dr. Helena Yli Renko teaches courses in entrepreneurship on the graduate and undergraduate levels at the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, University of Southern California.  Dr. Yli Renko’s research has won awards from the Academy of Management, the Babson-Kaufman Entrepreneur Research Conference, the International Council for Small Business World Conference, and the Finnish Academy of Science.

Dr. Yli Renko worked as a Research Fellow at London Business School conducting her dissertation research on the key customer relationships of young, middle market based firms, as well as other projects on European venture capital and the internationalization of young firms.  Dr. Yli Renko received her doctorate in 1999 from Helsinki University of Technology. Institute of Strategy and International Business.

Rick Andrade
He has over 20 years experience in business consulting and professional services. Prior to joining CP Rick spent several years as a small business owner and entrepreneur developing and earning a US Patent for a new retail product promotional system. His customers included advertising agencies, retail chains, and many Hollywood studios including Warner Bros, Sony, and 20th Century Fox.

After earning his BA and MBA degrees from UCLA Rick began his Big 5 Strategy Consulting career at Accenture, and then on to PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Cap Gemini/Ernst & Young where he was trained from the best in the business on how to solve tricky business problems. Over the years Rick has helped well over 100 Finance, Sales, Operations, and IT executives at dozens of companies large and small. His client accounts include Amgen, Mellon Bank, Sky Chef, Honeywell, Disney and Universal Studios to name a few.

Before joining the Big 5 firms Rick was a small business consultant helping small to mid size companies get financing, re-organize operations, develop new sales and marketing plans, install new IT systems, and help fundamentally identify better ways to improve bottom-line performance.

Rick’s vast experience across multiple industry segments further expands Capital Partner’s experience and capability to help our clients reach their financial goals. Having worked hand-in-hand with shirt-sleeve company executives in the trenches over the years, Rick has learned most importantly to listen carefully to each client’s problems and goals, and then to make sure we as a group completely understand the dynamics of each company step by step, before we offer our services.

Don Kim
Mr. Kim joined Capital Partners in 2008 and has participated in M&A transactions involving private and public companies in a wide range of industries, including consumer products, business services, healthcare, food and beverage, homeland security and technology. 

Previously, Mr. Kim worked for PeopleSupport, Inc. (NASD:PSPT) where he was Director of Corporate Development and responsible for all M&A activity, including full project management of transaction sourcing, analysis, deal structure, due diligence, closing and post-merger integration.  Prior thereto, Mr. Kim focused on the consumer products and technology sectors at USBX Advisory Services, a Los Angeles-based Investment Bank.  Mr. Kim has also held positions at KPMG LLP where he worked in the Economic and Valuation Services practice and a large aerospace company, where he served in strategic finance and operations management roles.

Mr. Kim earned his undergraduate degree from Oregon State University and his M.B.A. from the Marshall School of Business at University of Southern California graduating with honors.

Mark Gilbertson
Mr. Gilbertson has over twenty years in the corporate strategy development and new business venturing. Mr. Gilbertson’s work encompasses mega-brands and start-ups, and extends from system-wide interventions to team building to individual mentoring.  For the past 9 years Mark has been an affiliate of Strategos, a small group of consultants globally recognized for their ground breaking ideas on “strategy as innovation”. On recent assignments Mark’s team lead Shell Oil and BMW through the process of internal venture development to build centers of excellence in innovation. The results were recently described in a Harvard Business Review Article.

Mr. Gilbertson is also a member of the Intersection Group, a Los Angeles company that works at the nexus of strategy, brand and design to incubate new brands and manage existing brands within larger corporate entities.In the mid 90’s Mark worked with the Valley Economic Development Corporation to stage the Los Angeles Entrepreneur Series.  While this program trained hundreds of CEO’s in the areas of business planning and organizational development it also achieved its primary goal of fostering job growth in the local community.

Mark was also an associate in the Silicon  Valley and London offices of the MAC group, a corporate strategy consultancy serving multinational companies. He started his career as a foreign exchange trader at Bank of America in London. Mr. Gilbertson holds a B.S.C. in Monetary Economics from the Case Business School in the City of London and an MBA from the Andersen School of Management at U.C.L.A.

Clark Collins
Clark is a high energy and results driven executive leader with over 25 years of progressive executive leadership assignments in marketing management, strategic alliance and business development, strategic planning and consulting.

Recently, Collins worked for the world’s leading luxury travel consortia “Virtuoso” as EVP/CMO. While at Virtuoso, Collins was responsible for leading the company’s international marketing, sales support, strategic alliance, market research and strategic planning divisions. Collins served on Virtuoso’s executive committee reporting to the company’s CEO and President.

Clark Collins has spent the majority of his 25 year career as a thought leader in areas of business strategy and marketing, with several of the nations most respected brands in the financial services industry. Collins was the Senior Vice President of Marketing with Washington Mutual, one of the nation's most innovative and respected retailers of financial services, serving consumers and small to mid-sized businesses. While at Washington Mutual, Collins was the #2 executive responsible for all day-to-day operations including managing the bank’s $500MM marketing budget.

Prior to joining the executive ranks at Washington Mutual, Collins was senior executive with the Charles Schwab Corporation. During his career with Schwab, Collins lead marketing strategy and brand management as well as client profitability programs which included acquisition and client loyalty and retention related programs.

Before joining Schwab, Collins served as Managing Partner with a Southern California based integrated marketing consulting firm which provided brand strategy, integrated marketing, advertising and public relations services for early stage, established and pre-IPO clients. Collins began his career in financial services with Glendale Federal Bank, a California based regional thrift. While at Glendale federal Collins worked in several senior management roles including, Capital Markets, Operations & Administrative Services, Internal Consulting and Marketing.

Early in his career, Collins also served in several management level roles for a Los Angeles based publishing firm which catered to the affluent consumer segment.

Collins can be best described as a savvy marketer and thought leader with a wealth of integrated marketing experience as well as a proven track record in leadership with small, mid-sized and large fortune 500 companies. Collins represents a new age of marketing executives who has successfully blended his business strategic and analytical skills with his strategic marketing and communications acumen.

Ron Glickman
Ron Glickman is former Vice President of the Retail, Manufacturing, and Logistics Consulting Practice at Cognizant Technology Solutions, (CTSH) a public company. He is a global executive with a track record for leading innovative change programs, and delivering sustainable value from investments in business processes and enabling technologies. Ron has more than 25 years experience in the Retail, Consumer Product, Healthcare and Management Consulting industries. Prior to joining Cognizant, Ron was a senior Vice President and CIO at (Duty Free Shops in airports) DFS Group a subsidiary of Moet Hennessey-Lois Vuitton where he designed and delivered a global sourcing strategy that yielded annual expense savings of 48%, while tripling the productivity per dollar invested in technology enabled business outcomes.

Mr. Glickman has held Executive Information Technology positions at: Bristol Farms, Ralph;s Grocery Dairy Farm, (Hong Kong), the Gap, EDS Electronic Data Systems and the global accounting firm of KPMG Peat Marwick.

In 2003, Ron was named by Computerworld Premier as on the “elite” 100 IT leaders. He holds a BBA from National University and an MBA from the University of Southern California.

Jane Applegate
Jane Applegate is one of America’s leading small business, “middle market” management experts. A former columnist for the Los Angeles Times. She is the author of four popular books on entrepreneurial success. Her most recent, “The Entrepreneur’s  Desk Reference” was published by Bloomberg Press.

The Applegate Group Inc. is a New York based multimedia communications company. It provides small business content to publications and websites, as well as producing conference events for entrepreneurs.

Ms. Applegate’s corporate clients include Wells Fargo Bank, Mastercard International,  Sprint, General Motors and JP Morgan Chase.

Shad A. Mishu
Shad A. Mishu is an analyst at Capital Partners and facilitates deal processing. His roles include, writing investment memorandums, analyzing financial documents, preparing a list of buyers and sellers, and interacting with prospective clients.

Prior to joining Capital Partners, Shad was an assistant/intern to a Senior Financial Advisor at Ameriprise Financial Services, Inc where he learned and practiced market and investment theories. Aside from the professional and economic insights he received, Shad gained valuable perspectives on finding, creating, and maintaining personal long-term relationships with clients.

Shad received a Bachelor of Science Degree from the University of Southern California (USC), Marshall School of Business. He earned his degree in Entrepreneurship from the Llyod Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, where he wrote a business plan on business acquisitions expansion using leveraged buyouts.

On his free time, Shad enjoys trips to the beach, playing basketball, working out and spending time with his family.