Our modules have been developed by our firm’s founder, Mark Morris. His qualifications include a Bachelor of Commerce, a postgraduate Bachelor of Laws, a Master of Business Law, and various post graduate courses in finance and investments.
His Master of Business Law focused essentially on the laws and rules of mergers and takeovers, buying and selling companies, and major investments in companies. He has also read extensively on investments and business management has a passion for discovering how some seemingly similar companies significantly outperformed others and why some came out of an economic crisis far stronger while others were crippled by it, some fatally.
Mark founded and has had an ongoing role in the Rogers Morris business since its inception in about 2003. Its main business has focussed on arranging syndicates to invest mainly in unlisted companies generating annual EBIT profits of $3 million to about $10 million. Prior to establishing Rogers Morris, Mark worked as a project and corporate finance executive in the banking sector for about 10 years after practicing law for a short time.
Over the past 30 years he has reviewed a plethora of prospectuses (and similar) and considered either purchasing or investing in many mid-market ($3-19 million EBIT pa) unlisted businesses. This insight has revealed that most businesses in this sector are underperforming against their potential, and their shareholder values are way below the levels they could be commanding.
Some were undervalued due to being seen to be dependent on the owner or being seen as amateurishly managed. These companies present easy opportunities for significant value creation. A mere size increase can also create shareholder value in this market segment. For example, two similar businesses targeting different geographical markets, each valued at 4 times EBIT multiples, could together be valued at a 6-times multiple. In this case, by merely aggregating the businesses, one increases the value of both by 50%.
Further significant value creation comes from having a more professionally run business.These businesses are more likely to secure debt funding without the owner/s having to provide personal guarantees. This significantly reduces the amount of capital the owner has at risk, thereby significantly increasing the return on capital exposed. For example: In the case of a company valued on a 6-times EBIT multiple, if 50% of the business’ value is funded by a loan (without shareholder guarantees) at 5% interest, the value of the owner’s investment increases by 70%.
Early in his career Mark realised that the mid-market offers opportunities for significant shareholder value creation. He then spent a great deal of time analysing companies in this market segment and raising capital to buy or invest in these companies. This improved his knowledge of both the companies in and prospective investors for this segment of the market, which gave him further insight into the opportunities for shareholder value creation. It also led him to realise that the owners of many mid-market businesses suffered a lower sale price by not appropriately presenting their businesses to prospective investors , and that this was due to their having a mere superficial understanding of how businesses are valued.
Rather than just focusing on the buy or sell, Mark decided to also help these business owners obtain full value for their businesses. With this objective in mind, he developed the value creation program we are offering.
To discover more about the program and unlock the tools needed to obtain full value, Visit The Program .