ACG St. Louis January 2021 Private Equity Seminar

Holly Huels is Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Holleway Capital, providing financing to businesses whose owners want to sell their company and transition to retirement; aligning with management teams to continue to operate and grow the business. Along with her partner, Holly has led the acquisition of 28 privately-held companies representing approximately $500 million in transaction value. Among deals closed, her company raised a $75 million fund to invest in manufacturing and distribution companies with $10 to $100 million in sales located in the Greater Midwest and Southern regions of the United States. Holly also is the incoming President of the St. Louis Chapter ACG and has been a member of ACG for over 25 years, including 8 years as a board member.

Spencer Finney is a principal at Sage Capital having joined the firm shortly after its founding in 2005. Prior to joining Sage Capital, Spencer worked for The Northern Trust Company, providing retirement plan valuation and administration for large corporations. He is a graduate of The Olin School of Business at Washington University and the University of Richmond.

​Spencer currently serves as the chairman of the board of trustees of Villa Duchesne and Oak Hill School and is a member of the advisory council of Mission St. Louis.

Kevin Prunty is Vice President and Co-Head of the Private Debt & Equity team at Reinsurance Group of America (RGA). He is responsible for both direct and fund investments, focusing primarily on corporate subordinated debt and private equity.  RGA’s Private Debt & Equity team now has over $1.5B in AUM comprised of direct debt, direct equity and fund investments.  Kevin has 21 years of experience in all facets of corporate and leveraged finance, including origination, underwriting, structuring, and portfolio management across a wide range of industry sectors, as well as workout situations.  Kevin serves on multiple fund advisory boards and is a board observer for 15 portfolio companies.  He earned his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration (B.S.B.A.) degree from Washington University in St. Louis, where he was captain of the basketball team.  Kevin serves on the board of Addiction Is Real (AIR) a non-profit organization focused on drug addiction education founded by his wife Kelly, and lives in Chesterfield, MO with Kelly and their four children Jack (13), Henry (12), Grace (10) and William (8).

Brent is a Managing Director at Nolan & Associates. He joined Nolan in 2019, bringing over 25 years of sell side and buy side advisory experience from his relationships and transactions with privately-owned and family businesses, Fortune 500 corporations and leading private equity groups. To this point in his M&A career, Brent has closed over 200 transactions with an aggregate value of over $1 billion.

Brent is motivated by his passion for entrepreneurship, and sees his role advising buy side and sell side clients as a pleasure, and not as work. From his experience with business sellers, Brent has developed a deep understanding of business owners. He knows the importance of finding the right partner for an owner’s family and company legacy, while also helping them realize their lifelong financial goals. Through Brent’s buy side practice, he assists corporate acquirers in understanding their growth opportunities and also the non-monetary value drivers that are so important to sellers and vital to getting deals closed.

Brent is passionate about his leadership work with ACG, the Association for Corporate Growth. ACG is the leading global community for middle-market M&A deal-makers and business leaders focused on driving growth. He serves as the Chair of the Global Board for 2021. In 2019, Brent co-chaired the first-ever Strategic Acquirer Summit, bringing together corporate development professionals for a program focused on strategic acquisitions. 

Prior to joining Nolan, Brent spent 18 years as Managing Director of a St. Louis independent investment bank. Earlier in his career, he was the CEO of a food manufacturing company that more than quadrupled its sales by making acquisitions in a period of just eight years. Brent earned his undergraduate degree at Allegheny College, followed by his MBA at the University of Pittsburgh. Additionally, he serves on the board of directors for several privately held companies.

Brent serves as a Board Member and Executive Committee Member for the University City Children’s Center (UCCC) and the LUME Institute. The UCCC is a non-profit, early childhood education center in St. Louis that for 50 years has served as a transformative model of quality early care and education. LUME, funded in part by the Bezos Family Foundation, is training thousands of early childhood educators in the support of emotional development of children and its work has been recognized by the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University.

Brent worked all through college in an Italian gourmet restaurant, which fostered a lifelong passion for cooking (and some level of dishwashing!). Brent also finds time to travel, read and exercise. Brent and his wife have 2 sons, and he works from Nolan’s St. Louis office.