Contact: Brenon Daly
Following the historic upheaval at investment banks last fall, the changes have begun to filter down to the smaller firms, as well. For instance, Morgan Keegan & Co picked up tech boutique advisory shop Revolution Partners last December while hedge fund Ramius LLC has reached for Cowen Group in a deal that’s expected to close by the end of the year. And now we understand another change is set to play out in the tech banking business in the coming weeks.
A core quartet of bankers will be leaving Montgomery & Co to establish an independent tech M&A advisory firm, ArchPoint Partners. A source tells us that Rob Louv, Dan Williams and John Cooper will be ArchPoint’s managing partners, with Susan Blanco joining as a senior director. Initial plans call for San Francisco-based ArchPoint to possibly double its number of employees by the end of 2009, and perhaps double that figure again next year.
We are told the split from Montgomery will be pretty clean, with ArchPoint carrying over 10-20 existing clients. It has already brought in five or so clients on its own name, although the boutique won’t formally launch until next month. (ArchPoint already has its own license, and has no outside investors. Founders Cooper and Louv are backing the firm.) The split from Montgomery comes as the group has a bit of momentum behind it. Montgomery banked MX Logic in its sale to McAfee, the largest security transaction since last October and one that came with a refreshingly healthy multiple of 4 times MX Logic’s estimated sales.