FFL Partners Successfully Exits Investment in Accordion

EBITDA Quadrupled Over Four-Year Investment Period

SAN FRANCISCO – September 8, 2022 – FFL Partners (“FFL”), a private equity firm focused on growth investments in healthcare and tech-enabled services, announced today that it has exited its investment in Accordion (the “Company”), a private equity-focused financial and technology consulting firm, selling its interest to Charlesbank Capital Partners. The deal also includes investment from Motive Partners, a specialist private equity firm focused on financial technology. Financial terms of the private transaction were not disclosed.

Accordion provides operational, technical accounting, strategic financial planning and analysis, CFO technology, transaction execution, public company readiness, interim leadership, turnaround and restructuring, and other services spanning the entire CFO function. Headquartered in New York, the Company also has offices in Atlanta, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and South Florida. Accordion remains the only firm focused exclusively within the office of the CFO at private equity-backed companies and works alongside over 200 fund sponsors and their portfolio management teams across the investment lifecycle.

“Accordion is an excellent example of FFL’s Sector Exploration and Expertise Development (“SEED”) investment approach. We identified a secular trend of private equity firms becoming more focused on driving value creation and willing to outsource to best-of-breed specialists like Accordion,” said Cas Schneller, Managing Partner at FFL, adding, “We began as a client of Accordion, and were so impressed by Accordion’s differentiated, execution-oriented consulting model and the vision of CEO Nick Leopard that we decided to become his investment partner.”

Following its investment in October 2018, FFL helped strengthen Accordion’s senior management team with the recruitment of Atul Aggarwal from Bain & Company to serve as President of Accordion, as well as additional hires. FFL also worked closely with the Company on three successful acquisitions: Mackinac Partners, a Bloomfield Hills, Michigan-based turnaround and restructuring consulting firm; Platform Specialists, a Montclair, New Jersey-based CFO tech-enablement provider; and ABACI, an Atlanta, Georgia-based Enterprise Resourcing Planning and Enterprise Performance Management consultancy.

“FFL was aligned with our vision for growing Accordion, and their resources, guidance, and experience played a significant role in identifying and structuring transactions that helped us to expand our service offerings into new markets,” said Leopard. “During our partnership, the business expanded significantly, more than quadrupling EBITDA, and today we are well positioned to grow our team and our services as private equity firms seek great partners to help them outperform in a competitive environment.”

About FFL Partners
FFL Partners is a leading middle-market private equity firm that has been investing in high-quality companies since 1997. Based in San Francisco, FFL is a hyperspecialized, thematic investor focused on targeted areas within Healthcare and Tech-Enabled Services, two complementary sectors in which the firm has deep expertise and broad networks. FFL employs a proprietary sourcing and value creation strategy called the Sector Exploration and Expertise Development (“SEED”) process. The firm aims to partner with exceptional management teams and employs a high-engagement approach to accelerate growth at its businesses. FFL currently has over $5 billion of cumulative capital commitments. For additional information, please visit www.fflpartners.com.

About Accordion
Accordion is a private equity-focused financial and technology consulting firm. Working at the intersection of sponsors and management teams, Accordion partners with clients at every stage of the investment lifecycle. The firm’s services include operational and technical accounting, strategic financial planning and analysis, CFO-driven transformation, CFO technology, transaction execution, public company readiness, interim leadership, and turnaround and restructuring. With a focus on hands-on, results-oriented execution, Accordion is widely recognized as the go-to PE consultancy and the premier digital-enablement partner for portfolio company CFOs. In addition, Accordion has been recognized as an employer of choice for pioneering a better way to work in finance. Accordion has a total of 10 offices including its headquarters in New York and locations in Atlanta, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and South Florida.

For FFL Partners:
Kelly Holman
Stanton
646-502-3509
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