I asked Eric, who runs a portfolio of 14 companies and completed eight acquisitions in 12 months:
Why acquire events, conferences and exhibitions, and why are they great businesses?
"It's very hard for a new player to come into the B2B trade expo space because it's very hard to convince exhibitors to come to a new show when you can't guarantee there will be visitors coming."
"Likewise, it's also very hard to convince buyers to visit a new show if you can't guarantee there will be exhibitors coming. It's a little bit like online marketplaces - you need the supply to get the demand, but you also need the demand to get the supply."
"Once you get to the number one or number two position, you typically have quite good predictability in the business... you can raise prices above inflation because people want to come back to you."
"As you become the number one or number two player... you naturally get allocated a budget in your customers' plans for the following year... when we finish this year's show, we already know around 80% of next year's revenue is locked in."
"That's the part we really like about the business, where you can really predict how the business performs next year... barring trade wars and external factors, it's quite a predictable business."
Video
PrivateEquityGuy (Mikk Markus) (@PrivatEquityGuy)
My conversation with Eric. Him and @patrickgrove are building one of Southeast Asia's most interesting buy-and-build platforms.
They've completed 14 acquisitions (eight in 12 months) while creating a permanent home for market-leading businesses across digital media, B2B exhibitions, and vertical software.
We dive deep into capital allocation, decentralized operations, buy-and-build strategies and why live events may become even more valuable in the AI era.
Enjoy!
Timestamps:
0:00 Building Southeast Asia's serial acquirer
1:00 From failed startup to Catcha Digital
8:20 How Catcha Digital operates a decentralized holding company
13:05 Why 99 out of 100 acquisition opportunities get rejected
15:25 Lessons from Sweden's best serial acquirers
24:00 Why B2B trade exhibitions are exceptional businesses
28:40 The software acquisition strategy inspired by Constellation Software
30:15 The buy-and-build playbook behind Catcha Digital's growth
39:00 Learning from Danaher, Roper, Constellation & other compounders
43:50 Why live events become more valuable in an AI world
47:00 Working with Patrick Grove & building an acquisition machine
51:00 Capital allocation, going public & balancing long-term thinking with quarterly results
Video
— https://nitter.net/PrivatEquityGuy/status/2084970868715737572#m