ACG CIN: Financing Corporate Growth.

Peter Wright is an investment banker with Anderson LeNeave for the last 15 years.  Anderson LeNeave & Co is a lower middle market advisor to family owned, closely held and public companies who are looking to exit their business, make strategic acquisitions or looking for financing whether senior or junior debt, private equity or other types of investors.  Prior to joining Anderson LeNeave, he and a partner owned a security systems business, Trinity Security, which they founded, grew and sold to Diebold, a Fortune 500 company based in Ohio.  Prior to Trinity he was a founding member of Lionbridge Technologies as employee # 3.  Lionbridge is a technology service business based in Boston which he helped take public on NASDAQ in 1999 as Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Marketing.  Pete is a Cincinnati native and graduate of Miami University.

Scott Avera is a serial entrepreneur and angel investor.  His latest endeavor is as maker of ping™, the world’s best solution for backing up and utilizing the "know-how" of an organization.  As a member of Queen City Angels, Scott’s investments include NaviStone, cutting-edge supplier of first-party prospects and reactivation targets to include in direct mail campaigns, and QCA First Fund, the area’s leading early stage investment fund.

While in high school, Scott launched his first commercial software product, The Mind Machine. Upon graduation from Miami, he the joined Reynolds and Reynolds development team.  After graduating from Indiana University's M.B.A program, Scott became owner and General Manager of ASCENT SOLUTIONS INC, a data compression software company providing world-class multi-platform data transmission and protection solutions. The company’s well-known products included PKZIP and WinZip.  In 1998, INC. Magazine ranked the company 128th on their 500 fastest-growing companies list, and, in 2000, Scott was named a Technology Finalist in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awards.

In 2006, Scott co-founded and acted as Chairman of The Business Backer, a leading provider of alternative funding for small and mid-sized businesses. During his nine year tenure, the company grew from a start-up to a corporation lending nearly a quarter billion dollars to thousands of businesses across the nation. TBB was ranked in INC. Magazine’s Top 5000 Rankings four consecutive years with nearly twenty million in revenue in 2014. The company was sold to NYSE-listed Enova International in 2015.

John Gardner has been an active investor in global tech for over 25 years.  He is a Venture Partner at NGP Capital, which he helped co-found in 2005; a General Partner at 1809 Capital; and a Senior Advisor at Vesta Ventures. He currently works with the boards at Vida Health, RetailNext, and Adknowledge; prior board work includes Series B thru IPO with Rocket Fuel Inc. (FUEL); and Series C to IPO with Board PubMatic (PUBM). Prior to NGP, he was a founding General Partner at BlueRun Ventures and a Senior Business Development Manager at Nokia Corp. John graduated from Miami University in 1984 with a B.S. in Economics and Political Science. He also holds a J.D from the University of Cincinnati College of Law and an M.B.A from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Phil Collins is Founder, Managing Director and CEO of Orchard Holdings Group. Previously, he was a Managing Director of McCown De Leeuw & Co., a $1.2 billion middle-market private equity investment firm in New York City and Menlo Park.  He served on the investment committee and led numerous growth company investments, including three companies that grew to over $1 billion in revenue.  He started his career working for private investment pioneer Carl H. Lindner, Jr., then Chairman, CEO and Founder of American Financial Group, a $50 billion diversified financial services and investment company, and as a consultant at McKinsey & Co.  He is Chairman or Director of several privately held companies. 

He was appointed in 2016 by Governor John Kasich to the Board of Trustees of the University of Cincinnati, where he also serves as Chairman of the Investment Committee of the University’s $1.6 billion endowment; as a Director of UC Health, the university’s affiliated academic health system; as a Trustee and formerly Vice Chair of the University of Cincinnati Foundation; on the Dean’s Advisory Committee at the Lindner College of Business; and, along with his wife, as a Co-Chair of the University’s Bicentennial Commission.  He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Harvard Business School Club of Cincinnati and as a Section Chair for the Harvard Business School Annual Fund and the Campaign for Harvard.

Phil is a summa cum laude graduate of The University of Cincinnati, received an MBA with distinction from Harvard Business School and was a member of Class 30 of Leadership Cincinnati.

Barry Peterson co-founded Northcreek Mezzanine with Rodger Davis in 2008. His first endeavor with Davis was Private Capital Solutions.  Prior to PCS, Barry spent seven years with Provident Bank, where he was responsible for credit administration and portfolio management of the $4.6 billion commercial banking portfolio; sales and product development; and special projects. Peterson served on Provident’s Risk Management, Portfolio Management, and Executive Loan Committees. He was also responsible for starting and building Provident Business Credit, a national asset-based lending business with $650 million in loans.  Prior to his association with Provident, he was responsible for sales and marketing at American Louver Company, a $20 million annual revenue manufacturer of component products used in commercial lighting fixtures based in Skokie, Illinois. Peterson spent ten years with Continental Bank in Chicago and Los Angeles, and was responsible for building the Bank’s West Coast presence for its Business Credit Group and for helping start and build its Technology Finance Business. Peterson has B.A. in Economics from the University of Chicago and an MBA from the University of Notre Dame, with studies at the London School of Business.

Mike McCuen joined Keybank Cincinnati in December of 2017 as Market President and Commercial Banking Leader.  Mike previously spent over 20 years at National City and then PNC, having led the integration of Provident Bank into National City in 2004.  Mike’s experience includes National City Market President; Head of Middle- Market Banking for National City in Cleveland; and following the merger of National City Bank into PNC, Mike became Co-Head of Middle-Market and Large Corporate Banking for PNC.  Mike is active in the community having served leadership roles with several prominent organizations.  He is currently on the boards of Ursuline Academy and the Minority Business Accelerator, and is also a member of the Cincinnati Archdiocese Finance Council. Mike earned his BS in Economics from John Carroll University and his MBA from the University of Michigan.