Coastal Breeze Partners, a Boca Raton, FL-based middle market private equity firm, announced that it has started operations.
The firm focuses on partnering with management teams and sellers to build middle market businesses. It also combines deep sector expertise in industrial and business services sub sectors with a proven track record of value creation.
The firmās strategy is focused on making control investments into companies with over $20M; in revenue and EBITDA of $4M to $20M, that are either family/founder owned or corporate carve-outs, in the following industry sectors:
- Essential Business Services
- Materials & Chemicals
- Specialty Industrials
- Value-Added Distribution
Founded by Brian Urbanek and Matthias Gundlach, Coastal Breeze Partners is thesis driven and differentiated through the execution of organic growth initiatives, operational transformation initiatives and strategic add-on acquisitions.
Gundlach has 25 years of investing, merger & acquisition and corporate finance experience. He has completed over 30 transactions for businesses across multiple jurisdictions, sectors and types. Prior to founding Coastal Breeze, Gundlach served as Managing Director at OpenGate Capital, a global lower-to-middle-market private equity firm. As Head of OpenGateās North American industrials investment team, he focused on transformational value creation opportunities in chemicals, ingredients, building products, industrials and distribution. Prior to OpenGate, Gundlach was a Vice President at Sun European Partners, the London based investment arm of Sun Capital Partners, a global private equity firm focused on investing in lower and middle market companies. Prior to Sun Capital, Gundlach worked in investment banking at Goldman Sachs in Frankfurt and at Deutsche Bank in London. As part of a dual degree Gundlach received a Master of Business Administration from University of Pittsburgh, KATZ Graduate School of Business and a Master of Business Administration from EBS UniversitƤt fĆ¼r Wirtschaft und Recht.
Urbanek is co-founder of Coastal Breeze Partners and has over 25 years of investing, merger & acquisition and corporate finance experience. Urbanek has completed over 40 transactions for businesses across multiple industries, including business services, industrial, consumer, retail, automotive & heavy-duty, financial services, packaging, chemicals, and healthcare. His investment activities included control buyout transactions, as well as non-control recapitalization transactions. Urbanek also completed ongoing work with portfolio companies, including the strategic planning, operational reviews, management recruiting, financing and restructuring needs, add-on acquisitions and exit transactions. Prior to founding Costal Breeze, Urbanek was the co-founder and managing partner of Harbor Beach Capital, where he continues to actively manage two platform investments. Prior to founding Harbor Beach Capital, Urbanek served as Managing Director at Sun Capital Partners, a global private equity firm focused on investing in lower and middle market companies. Prior to Sun Capital, he was a Vice President in the Corporate Finance group at Stephens, Inc. Prior to that, Urbanek served as a Vice President with the investment banking group at Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc., and as Manager of Corporate Development with AutoNation, Inc. Urbanek received a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, cum laude, with dual majors in Economics and Finance from Creighton University’s Heider College of Business.
FinSMEs
25/04/2025