Fast Facts
Investment Date: August 2011
Industry: Industrial
Ownership Profile: Privately-owned
Exit Year: 2024
Overview
Summit is a specialty industrial mechanical contractor offering engineering, design-assist and turnkey, direct hire construction services of modular systems serving the advanced technology, power, and industrial sectors. Summit’s capabilities encompass a wide range of modular and site-based construction including process piping, equipment setting, large pipe rack trestles, and related steel erection and specialty concrete work. Summit is a trusted supplier to some of the world’s largest advanced technology, power and industrial companies and is currently deployed on several major chip fabrication projects. In 2011, The Stephens Group completed a majority recapitalization of the business and successfully exited our control position to Comfort Systems USA in 2024.
“The Stephens Group has been a wonderful and patient partner the last twelve years. With their support, we added key personnel to our team, evaluated several acquisition targets, and strategically shifted our end markets of focus.”
Jeff Johnson
CEO of Summit
Investment Thesis
- Winning greater volumes of scaled project work as a result of a well-capitalized balance sheet and bonding capabilites
- The recapitalization will enhance balance sheet, giving Summit the required bonding capacity and more importantly, the credibility with customers to pursue larger projects, allowing for aggressive growth
- Strength of Leadership Team: Jeff Johnson (former president of VCC – Atlanta) was appointed as CEO and Jim Watson (co-founder of Summit) played a strategic advisor role
- Pursuing more shutdown / outage work, which was previously constrained due to lack of working capital, and is profitable and recurring revenue stream
- Deepen relationships with OEM customers to help provide turn-key capabilities
Entry to Exit Evolution
~
30
x
revenue growth
~
70
x
EBITDA growth
Key Value-Add Initiatives
Strategic pivots to growing end markets
During SG’s ownership, Summit implemented two strategic pivots to capture demand in rapidly-growing end markets, first to the midstream oil & gas market, and more recently to the onshoring of advanced technology infrastructure.
Highly disciplined bid strategy
Focus on pursuing profitable jobs in Advanced Technology that aligned with Summit’s core competencies
Management team additions
Recruit and retain reliable high-performers with excellent reputations in the space
Contract risk management and project execution
Thorough documentation of work to be performed followed by intensive project management