Red Mountain Capital Advisors Announces New Advances in Independent, Founder-Aligned Advisory in the Middle Market

Red Mountain Capital Advisors, an independent investment bank founded by veteran dealmakers Chris Teets and Craig Collar, is positioning itself as a differentiated advisory firm built specifically for founders and family-owned businesses navigating complex strategic transactions.

The firm was created to address a persistent misalignment within middle-market M&A. While founders are often making one of the most significant decisions of their careers, they are often sitting across the table from experienced professional dealmakers by themselves or with a financial advisor whose incentives are tied to transaction volume or longstanding relationships with private equity firms.

Red Mountain was built with a different mandate.

The firm’s origin reflects the complementary paths of its founders. Teets and Collar first met at Goldman Sachs, working on M&A transactions before pursuing distinct careers that would ultimately shape Red Mountain’s perspective. After Goldman Sachs, Teets spent nearly two decades as a principal investor, serving on both public and private boards and working alongside management teams to drive long-term value creation. Collar continued his M&A career advising large institutions at firms including Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley, leading complex transactions across industries.

That dual vantage point revealed the same structural issue from different angles. Founders build great businesses, but they may only sell them once in their lifetime. The likely buyer is often a private equity firm or family office whose entire business model is built around acquiring and selling companies. These are professional investors, and they are typically very skilled, with deep knowledge of the transaction process. Hiring the right financial advisor to support a sale or capital raise can help rebalance those dynamics in favor of the founder.

Because of this, Red Mountain operates with a senior-led structure, where founding partners remain directly involved in every engagement from initial strategy through final negotiation. There are no handoffs to junior teams, and the firm works with a limited number of clients at any given time. This approach prioritizes depth, continuity, and accountability throughout the transaction lifecycle.

But another structural issue that Teets and Collar saw was that many financial advisors have an inherent conflict, as private equity firms are often their biggest fee-paying clients. They operate in a continuous cycle with the private equity firms that may not be in the best interests of their founder/family-owned business clients.

Financial advisors sell founder-owned businesses to private equity firms, which then hire the same advisors to sell portfolio companies of those same private equity firms, and so on, all in the name of “sponsor coverage.” This creates an imbalance in experience and incentives. Will that financial advisor really push that private equity firm as far as they can on behalf of their founder-owned business client if the financial advisor is looking to be hired on that same private equity firm’s next sellside? Red Mountain was designed to remove that potential conflict.

Red Mountain does not solicit business from private equity firms. Although Red Mountain maintains relationships with financial sponsors, those relationships exist on behalf of its clients, not its own P&L. The firm does not seek mandates from private equity firms to sell portfolio companies or finance transactions. This eliminates significant potential conflicts when those same firms pursue investments in Red Mountain clients.

The result is a business model centered on independence and alignment with the founder. Red Mountain clients know the firm is entirely in their corner - 100 percent of the time.

Red Mountain advises clients across sell-side M&A, buy-side M&A, growth capital raising, and broader strategic transactions. The firm’s leadership brings more than five decades of combined experience, with a transaction history in a variety of industries including aviation, aerospace, industrials, consumer, retail, financial services, energy, technology, media and others. The firm also owns a FINRA/SIPC registered broker-dealer, Red Mountain Securities, an increasingly rare asset among boutique investment banks, allowing it to raise capital directly on behalf of its clients.

Internally, the firm frames its role as guiding founders through each phase of a complex process, emphasizing preparation, positioning, and disciplined execution. Engagements are approached as long-term partnerships rather than discrete transactions, with a focus on aligning outcomes with the founder’s broader objectives.

As the middle-market advisory landscape continues to evolve, demand is increasing for firms that combine institutional capability with independent, founder-aligned advice. Red Mountain Capital Advisors is positioning itself within that shift through a model built on experience, restraint, and structural alignment.

Red Mountain Capital Advisors is headquartered in Los Angeles, with an additional office in Newport Beach, California, and advises founder-led and family-owned businesses across the United States.