March 18, 2024
January 2022, Clarke Advisors listed “Top 20 Investment Banking Firms” (Axial)
February 2021, Clarke Advisors listed seventh “Top 50 Lower Middle Market Industrial Investors & M&A Advisors” (Axial)

Based in the Phoenix Metropolitan area, Clarke Advisors, LLC provides the highest quality services including: Institutional Equity Placements, Merger, Acquisition and Divestiture for Lower Middle Market, Closely-Held Private Companies. Clarke has an Industry Focus in the Supply Chain including Transportation, Logistics, Warehousing and related Technologies.

Clarke’s services include:


Clarke has the ability to handle lower middle market transactions, between $10 and $250 million. Our Merger and Acquisition practice has a market focus on the Transportation and Logistics Industry. We cover buyers and sellers and alternative forms of capital on a nationwide basis. Our preference is to focus on Private Equity and the Larger Strategic Buyers of these companies where a clean transaction can be closed without the need for Promissory Notes, Owner Carry Backs or Resets based on future performance.

Clarke’s Merchant Group makes principal investments in closely held basic industry and service oriented companies. We are available for consultation about your plans and objectives at 480-488-1929 or nec@clarkeadvisors.net


Recent Transactions

The Value of Investment Banking

Doug Braunstein, Head of Investment Banking, J.P. Morgan:

“The days of two CEOs meeting in a room and reaching a handshake are over. Deals are much more complicated. There needs to be a company and advisers who are adept at addressing a broader range of issues.”

Boon Sim, Americas Head of M&A, Credit Suisse Group:

“Clients actually need bankers more in complex transactions. They need us less in the straightforward M&A assignments. On those types of deals, we have educated the clients well over the past two decades; they’ve hired MBAs and ex-bankers, and people get more sophisticated. Their needs have naturally evolved. But when they need us, they need us more than before given the increasingly complicated world we live in.”

Gene Sykes, Co-Chairman of M&A, Goldman, Sachs & Co.:

“The role of advice today takes into account a much broader range of insight than the pure merger advice that [Americas M&A head Tim Ingrassia] and I were trained in when we started our careers. The last 10 years have seen this evolve. While the individual relationships are still at the heart of what makes this business work for people, the breadth of insight is a very important part as well.”