Unison announces minority private equity investment
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Unison Risk Advisors, which was created through the merger of Oswald Cos. and Riggs, Counselman, Michaels & Downes Inc. in 2020, has secured a capital investment from Toronto-based private equity firm Peloton Capital Management Inc.
Terms of the deal, which is expected to close on March 31, were not disclosed. The brokerage’s existing employees will continue to own a majority of the company after the investment.
The Cleveland-based brokerage will use the investment to make a series of acquisitions over the next several years, said Robert J. Klonk, chairman and CEO of Unison, which is the 33rd largest brokerage of U.S. business with $146 million in 2020 revenue, according to Business Insurance’s most recent ranking.
“We are not looking to buy 10 or 12 firms a year, we are talking about select partners who believe in what we believe in. It could be two, it could be four,” he said.
The company is looking largely to acquire active owners who will roll their equity into Unison and remain with the company, Mr. Klonk said.
“When they come and join our platform, all their employees will become owners, they’ll be able to run their own shop, maintain autonomy, they become a Union Risk Advisors company but don’t have to take our name, and we bring shared resources to them that they probably don’t have,” Mr. Klonk said.
Peloton has committed to support Unison for 10 to 12 years, he said. In addition to acquisitions, the brokerage will seek to continue to grow organically by 8% to 10% a year, Mr. Klonk said.
“We’re trying to not just preserve the independent model, we’re trying to grow it to the point where it’s sustainable, particularly for large regional firms,” said Bob Cawley, president of Unison. “We are not in the aggregation business; we are in the business of looking for partners who believe what we believe.”
