self-funded searcher looking to acquire a small business with $1-2M in EBITDA

founder, operator, sales leader, entrepreneur & angel investor

scaling multiple businesses from zero to $1B

Past Experience
Guiding Principals

Hard work & integrity lead to great things

Live with Passion

Think Critically

Act with Conviction

Listen More Than I Talk

Be Unconventional

Build Community

$5B
Revenue
Generated
1500
Careers
Developed
5
Businesses
Launched
75
Founder-Driven Investments
Background and Approach

Years of Operating in the Trenches
&
Helping Founders Find Their Way

I am currently a self-funded searcher looking to acquire a business doing $1-2M in EBITDA (SDE). Primary industries of focus include SaaS, eCommerce, wholesale & distribution, and light manufacturing. I am looking for a businesses with a proven track record of cash flow and the characteristics of an enduringly profitable business.

Ideal business target has strong product market fit with an established product or service that lacks an integrated sales & marketing strategy.

I have the means, motivation, resources, and team to close on a business quickly and efficiently.
----
15+ years of operational experience, sales leadership and entrepreneurship has led me to devote much of my professional and personal time to helping founders realize their vision.

I have invested in more than 50 founder-driven companies across a broad range of sectors, including B2B SaaS, agtech, health & wellness, proptech, cybersecurity, and cleantech.

I look for great founders who are dedicated to making their vision of the 🌎 a reality. My goal is to help founders reach the point where an institutional investor can lead, price and diligence their next round of financing.

Investment Criteria

Strong founding teams, building software, with at least some technical background. I evaluate on the following criteria,

1. Founder / Team
2. Market / Opportunity
3. Product / Idea

References

Mike is the sales leader we needed to kick off and navigate Taboola's hyper-growth into the $1B+ business it is today. Over the years, Mike has had a ridiculous track record for building successful sales teams that address new business opportunities and customer segments. As an executive, Mike leads by example as a hands-on, strategic expert and by inspiring others with the passion for client solutions and sales excellence that drives him. As a colleague, I have often relied on Mike for advice and as a sounding board; his ability to stay calm and measured in chaotic environments is probably a huge part of his success as a start-up sales executive. Any company would be lucky to have Mike run their sales organization.

Andrew Milk
Director of Client Strategy, Attentive

I worked with Mike and his Sales teams over the course of 6 years at Taboola, collaborating on top opportunities from pre-sales through successful customer launch. In that time, I witnessed the significant contribution Mike made to the company, from rapidly building and leading a highly-productive Sales team, to establishing a culture of excellence within the office. Mike has impressive knowledge of the ad tech space, and yet he's always open to additional perspectives and expertise in order to provide the best experience for our customers. I welcome the opportunity to work with him again in the future.

Tom Dunlap
Client Solutions & Delivery, Taboola

It's hard to find someone more dedicated and passionate than Mike. In the time that I worked for him at Taboola, Mike's curiosity and ambition led him to constantly improve his team and grow his people; even when I was promoted to a new role in the company, Mike took me to lunch and told me he'd always be in my corner. His accomplishments at Taboola are myriad (he built and scaled a hugely successful sales & account management organization) but he also advocates relentlessly for his people and constantly seeks improvements in all aspects of the team. Not one to shy away from a challenge or settle for "that's the way it's always been done," Mike is a strong addition to any team.

Chris Becker
Strategic Project Management, Taboola

Michael is not your typical executive. I have not met a more down to earth, approachable leader. On and off the clock, Michael is incredibly helpful across all of our touchpoints - guiding and sharing his insights from his deep experience in our line of business. It's rare these days to see someone committed to a business for as long as Michael, let alone reinvent himself several times, growing with the company from a few to over a thousand. All of this while maintaining the same level of excellence that he expected from his employees, but mostly from himself. For these and many other reasons, Michael would be a linchpin for any company, regardless of size or line of business.

Gal Salomon
Senior Data Analyst at Taboola

When I first joined Mike's team as an enterprise seller it was clear that the expectations were high. In a highly competitive market, Mike challenged us to always stay one-step-ahead of our competition, to constantly innovate and improve how we sell, utilize all the resources available to us and constantly refine the processes by which we operated. The result was a series of initiatives, approaches and tactics that definitely set us apart. It is a credit to Mike's ability to both establish a vision and implement the tactics to always position the team and the company for success. It's that type of leadership that saw him at the center of planning, executing and scaling three business units within Taboola from inception to maturity. Not only will Mike have the interests of the company in mind, but he is fiercely loyal to his reports and always acted as an advocate on my behalf. No greater evidence of this than my own path at Taboola. Having his support and guidance helped me realize my own career ambitions and aspirations. For this, I am eternally grateful. I have always looked to Mike for guidance as both a manager and a mentor. He is a tremendous asset to any organization.

Nate Dietz
Team Lead, Client Solutions and Delivery

I had a great experience working for and with Mike for nearly six years. On a personal level, I could always count on his expert guidance in how to manage complex negotiations and he consistently demonstrated a knack for creating deal structures that set both organizations up for success. Under Mike’s leadership, the size and scope of our organization grew dramatically as three separate business units were identified, developed and scaled across the Americas. Mike does an amazing job of balancing the team’s focus on near term KPIs, tactics and processes, while setting a vision for long term success. I learned a great deal from Mike about partnerships and how to scale an organization; I would absolutely welcome the opportunity to work with him again.

James Arthur
Head of Major Accounts, Taboola

I have had the pleasure of working alongside Mike at Taboola, back at 2012 when Taboola was less than 50 people and even more so when I returned in 2016 and he was running a massive and extremely successful sales org. Mike effectively scaled the business team from inception through maturity (enterprise, smb, non-traditional). Mike has a unique capability to deeply understand the partner's requirements, handle it with a very partner focused mentality and a WIN-WIN approach and a strong eye for the detail that delivers upon and supports the commercial objectives. I strongly recommend Mike to any organisation looking for an experienced, senior and astute commercial leader to drive their business forward.

Orel Hashmatia
VP of AI Labs, AnyVision

Michael is a great business partner to work with - he always keeps track of the business progress without ever losing sight of the strategic objective. He is a creative business leader with excellent hand on execution abilities. I'll be happy to continue cooperating with him in future ventures.

Ehud Furman
VP Audience Extension & Data, Taboola

Michael is the ideal business partner for an IT Leader. He has deep knowledge of the field and is able to quickly align sales requirements with company priorities, allowing him to be strategic and efficient with company resources. When Michael said something was important, I trusted his judgment and we worked together to make it happen - and he got results. Not only that, he had a knack for thinking outside of the box, building strategic relationships with customers and moving mountains for partners big and small, while making everyone feel part of a winning team.

Ariel Pisetzky
VP Information Technology, Taboola

Mike is the sales leader we needed to kick off and navigate Taboola's hyper-growth into the $1B+ business it is today. Over the years, Mike has had a ridiculous track record for building successful sales teams that address new business opportunities and customer segments. As an executive, Mike leads by example as a hands-on, strategic expert and by inspiring others with the passion for client solutions and sales excellence that drives him. As a colleague, I have often relied on Mike for advice and as a sounding board; his ability to stay calm and measured in chaotic environments is probably a huge part of his success as a start-up sales executive. Any company would be lucky to have Mike run their sales organization.

Andrew Milk
Director of Client Strategy, Attentive

I worked with Mike and his Sales teams over the course of 6 years at Taboola, collaborating on top opportunities from pre-sales through successful customer launch. In that time, I witnessed the significant contribution Mike made to the company, from rapidly building and leading a highly-productive Sales team, to establishing a culture of excellence within the office. Mike has impressive knowledge of the ad tech space, and yet he's always open to additional perspectives and expertise in order to provide the best experience for our customers. I welcome the opportunity to work with him again in the future.

Tom Dunlap
Client Solutions & Delivery, Taboola

I had a great experience working for and with Mike for nearly six years. On a personal level, I could always count on his expert guidance in how to manage complex negotiations and he consistently demonstrated a knack for creating deal structures that set both organizations up for success. Under Mike’s leadership, the size and scope of our organization grew dramatically as three separate business units were identified, developed and scaled across the Americas. Mike does an amazing job of balancing the team’s focus on near term KPIs, tactics and processes, while setting a vision for long term success. I learned a great deal from Mike about partnerships and how to scale an organization; I would absolutely welcome the opportunity to work with him again.

James Arthur
Head of Major Accounts, Taboola

I have had the pleasure of working alongside Mike at Taboola, back at 2012 when Taboola was less than 50 people and even more so when I returned in 2016 and he was running a massive and extremely successful sales org. Mike effectively scaled the business team from inception through maturity (enterprise, smb, non-traditional). Mike has a unique capability to deeply understand the partner's requirements, handle it with a very partner focused mentality and a WIN-WIN approach and a strong eye for the detail that delivers upon and supports the commercial objectives. I strongly recommend Mike to any organisation looking for an experienced, senior and astute commercial leader to drive their business forward.

Orel Hashmatia
VP of AI Labs, AnyVision

Michael is a great business partner to work with - he always keeps track of the business progress without ever losing sight of the strategic objective. He is a creative business leader with excellent hand on execution abilities. I'll be happy to continue cooperating with him in future ventures.

Ehud Furman
VP Audience Extension & Data, Taboola

Michael is the ideal business partner for an IT Leader. He has deep knowledge of the field and is able to quickly align sales requirements with company priorities, allowing him to be strategic and efficient with company resources. When Michael said something was important, I trusted his judgment and we worked together to make it happen - and he got results. Not only that, he had a knack for thinking outside of the box, building strategic relationships with customers and moving mountains for partners big and small, while making everyone feel part of a winning team.

Ariel Pisetzky
VP Information Technology, Taboola

It's hard to find someone more dedicated and passionate than Mike. In the time that I worked for him at Taboola, Mike's curiosity and ambition led him to constantly improve his team and grow his people; even when I was promoted to a new role in the company, Mike took me to lunch and told me he'd always be in my corner. His accomplishments at Taboola are myriad (he built and scaled a hugely successful sales & account management organization) but he also advocates relentlessly for his people and constantly seeks improvements in all aspects of the team. Not one to shy away from a challenge or settle for "that's the way it's always been done," Mike is a strong addition to any team.

Chris Becker
Strategic Project Management, Taboola

Michael is not your typical executive. I have not met a more down to earth, approachable leader. On and off the clock, Michael is incredibly helpful across all of our touchpoints - guiding and sharing his insights from his deep experience in our line of business. It's rare these days to see someone committed to a business for as long as Michael, let alone reinvent himself several times, growing with the company from a few to over a thousand. All of this while maintaining the same level of excellence that he expected from his employees, but mostly from himself. For these and many other reasons, Michael would be a linchpin for any company, regardless of size or line of business.

Gal Salomon
Senior Data Analyst at Taboola
Investor Philosophy

Invest in people first.. Then ideas

I believe the greatest opportunities occur at the point of convergence, either in market or technologies, preferably both.

Select Portfolio Companies

Passions & Interests

Running & Hiking

Yoga

Competitive Cyclist

Meditation and Self Exploration

Angel/Early-Stage Investing

Volunteer Work

Community Development

Travel & Photography

Contact me

Let's Get in Touch

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