East Wind Advisors

East Wind Advisors was proud to co-organize EdTech Prime Time at the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange - ?????? ??????? ??? on November 6, the 3rd day of Israel EdTech Week 2024. This event showcased the burgeoning talent in Israel's EdTech ecosystem, addressed the provocative theme of "uncertainty" and featured an inspiring roster of speakers, including Marc Sternberg Sarah Rose Siskind Michael Eisenberg Shahar Botzer Hilla Ovil-Brenner Alon Stopel Tomer Simon, PhD Ami Moyal Eli Hurvitz Pierre-Antoine Ullmo Noga Gil Bassi Tomer Haims and our own Joshua Schwartz. We are grateful for our partnership with The Center for Educational Technology (CET) and MindCET- EdTech Innovation Center, led by Yossi Baidatz and Avi warshavsky and admire the hard work of Lea Cecilia Waismann, Ph.D. Dana M. Talia Kolodny and Ilan Ben Yaakov, among many others. Finally, thanks to The Paul E. Singer Foundation and The Kadar Foundation for your generous support.

In Issue 4 of East Wind Advisors' The Current, we sat down with founder Derek Belch, who is leading a (to date) quiet revolution in workforce development through his enterprise-focused extended reality (XR) company, STRIVR. Workforce Development is a high priority for our franchise, so we relished the opportunity to hear from one of the true innovators in this area. We share Derek’s view that it is just a matter of time before XR becomes ubiquitous across corporate enterprises and other organizations. Please have a look and comment freely. #workforcedevelopment #extendedreality #XR #VR #AR #AI https://lnkd.in/excdUv7s

East Wind Advisors presents results from our capital markets sentiment survey conducted within our network of investors and lenders. The survey suggests that sentiment skews positive for the next six months. In addition, we highlight 1H24 public market performance and key transactions in our primary coverage areas. In the public market, standouts include companies operating in postsecondary education and value/mass retail, while underperformers of note included workforce & lifelong learning, marketing information, broadcasting & filmed entertainment, digital audio & video and leisure products. As for deal activity, transaction volume has picked up from 2023 levels, a trend which, from our vantage point, we expect to accelerate in the back half of the year and into 2025 (with some caveats noted in The Current). https://lnkd.in/eCs7X-R6 #capitalmarkets #mergersandacquisitions #edtech #mediaandentertainment #consumer

In Issue 4 of the East Wind Current - 'For Whom the Pendulum Swings', we speak with Derek Belch, who is leading a (to date) quiet revolution in workforce development through his enterprise-focused extended reality (XR) company, STRIVR. We feature four new additions to the East Wind Advisors' Team, as we continue to add the highest quality talent to better service our clients’ needs. East Wind’s David Kaufthal and Jason Birke return in this edition to discuss how professional service firms should be thinking about competitive advantage. Once again, we share the results of our Market Survey that show the sentiment on the market environment collected from our network of investors. We interviewed our own Partner Peter Rothschild, who shares valuable insights on the investment banking industry after 40+ years of experience. Finally, the Market Roundup section highlights 1H24 public market performance and notable transactions for our coverage areas. #investmentbanking #extendedreality #xr #ar #vr #workforcetraining #mediaandentertainment #edtech #education #consumer #retail #mergersandacquisitions #professionalservices Find the bulletin here: https://lnkd.in/eJcg8yJW

East Wind is collaborating with Jamie Gutfreund and Creator Vision on a survey of Creator Economy measurement tools.?DM us if you'd like to participate. #digitalmarketing #creatoreconomy #marketing #ifnluencermarketing #socialmedia #future

Fun one to be a part of! Thank you Gemma Lenowitz and Anna Bao (!) for hosting a great event and inviting me to frame the landscape and tease a few questions about the workforce of tomorrow. ?? TLDR: skills development must keep up with the pace of tech advancements. Technological literacy is one side of the coin… self-efficacy and social influence skills are vital to be able to respond quickly to change and automation. What are the best models to scale skills training for the workforce of the future? How will data be used to inform personalized training pathways? ?? All to help set the stage for a panel of speakers who are leading organizations that are building much needed pathways and advancing innovation Andrew Tein from Coursera | Eleazar Adjehoun ?? from The Knowledge House | Pierre Dubuc from OpenClassrooms | Jukay Hsu from Pursuit Future of Higher Ed | Samvid Ventures | East Wind Advisors

We are delighted to welcome Richard Duron?to East Wind Advisors. Richard joins our firm as Senior Managing Director from Atlas Advisors, where he spent the last nine years advising on an array of transactions in the consumer and basic industries sectors. Earlier in his career, Richard spent seven years at UBS, where his last position was Vice Chairman in the Wealth Management International Americas division. He also ran UBS's Wealth Management operations in?Canada?and?Latin America. Prior to UBS, Richard spent 24 years at JPMorgan in various functions and headed the M&A group for?Latin America. At East Wind, Richard will build on his relationships with clients in various industries with a primary focus on the consumer sector. Press release can be found here: https://bit.ly/4dawyBa

In this new issue of our Spotlight column, we sat down with our own VP Natalie Bader. After starting her investment banking career at Goldman Sachs, she sought a boutique advisory firm where she could work directly with earlier-stage, emerging growth companies and innovative founders and on flatter deal teams. We were happy to fit the bill! Natalie talks about her role, East Wind Advisors' unique qualities and culture, and shares her perspective on deal execution. #investmentbanking #mergersandacquisitions #dealexecution #corporateculture Link: https://lnkd.in/eRwSuBJM

East Wind Advisors is pleased to present our new M&A Insights column. In this issue, David Kaufthal and Jason Birke discuss value-enhancing tactics for professional services firm owners. Topics include crafting clearly defined growth plans, building and incentivizing a management team, and honing a differentiation strategy. ? Future installments of this series will cover competitive advantage and sell-side process tactics, and more. Stay tuned! ? #professionalservices #businessservices #value #businessgrowth #dealmaking #mergersandacquisitions #corporatestrategy #serviceproviders? ? https://lnkd.in/eNBx7QUd

East Wind Advisors presents results from our capital?markets sentiment?survey?conducted within our network of investors and lenders.?As we continue this feature and develop more longitudinal data, we believe the insights we can draw from the data will be more meaningful. For now, sentiment appears to skew moderately positive, and the pendulum that had swung so decidedly in favor of profitability at the expense of growth may be beginning to show some signs of reversal. In addition, we highlight 2H23 public?market?performance and key transactions in our primary coverage areas.?The Live Entertainment sector stood out this past year, and Education companies demonstrated notable growth in 2023. Meanwhile, growth in Value/Mass Retail and Restaurants reflects the resiliency of the economy. As for the deal activity, while volumes were certainly down across the board in 2023, high quality assets continued to trade at premia and the large stash of investor “dry powder” continued to fuel demand for transactions, albeit with a more selective veneer. #capitalmarkets #mergersandacquisitions #edtech #mediaandentertainment #liveentertainment #consumer https://lnkd.in/ecPVvwKb