OUR FIRM
Yorkdale Partners is a full-service investment bank and advisory firm focused on bringing innovative companies to market. We leverage a combination of unique experience across a veteran team of professionals and enterprise technology to deliver long-term value to our clients.
Our experience covers a wide range of international and domestic experience ranging from lower middle market to large scale, complex transactions.
We understand that business decisions can be complex and involve the careful consideration of many issues beyond a fair price. These factors include: varying shareholder interests, legacy issues, buyer matching, cultural/geographic interests, tax implications, and regulatory frameworks.
The Yorkdale team offers a disciplined and value-focused approach to ensure our clients are set up for success beyond the transaction at hand.
Read about our services & solutions
Yorkdale Partners provides world class M&A advisory services to lower-middle market business owners and investors pursuing transaction. We are experts in generating shareholder values. Yorkdale Partners has deep relationships with the private equity communities in both Canada and the US, and our reach into the strategic acquirer is extensive. Moreover, Yorkdale Partners offers buy-side advisory services to either corporate acquirers pursuing an M&A growth strategy. We bring to the table a combination of strategic and well developed transaction execution skills and exceptional industry domain expertise to deliver superior valuations, speed to closure, and high probability of success.
We recognize that not all companies require the same level of 3rd party consultation and representation. Please reach out to us to discus your specific needs and how we can best accommodate them.
OUR PARTNERS.
Paul Kallmes
Partner with Yorkdale Partners, San Francisco/Silicon Valley
Paul brings an extensive array of skills from over 20 years experience in venture capital, business consulting, and the IP management field.
Paul currently heads the Zeitgeist Fund which invests in promising early-stage technology companies and is deeply involved with The Vault, a well known San Francisco based business incubator. He also consults with numerous European companies expanding into the North American market.
Paul has built and managed patent portfolios in a number of traditional manufacturing industries including paper and textiles. He has worked with a range of organizations; consulting firms KPMG and IP Value, high-tech R&D labs, including Rockwell Scientific, and IP marketplace start-ups including Yet2.com.
Paul previously managed the patent portfolio of Nasdaq-listed Color Kinetics and enjoyed considerable success in turning the company’s licensing practice into a profitable and industry-friendly activity. Color Kinetics was subsequently sold for $794 million USD. Following his work at Color Kinetics, he became the IP Strategist at the Lighting Science Group.
In recent years he has been an independent consultant to the LED industry, advising on the development of patent portfolios and products including control chips, power supplies, light drivers and complete fixtures such as LED street lights and therapeutic LED light fixtures. Paul believes that effective IP asset management starts at the beginning of a company’s lifespan and should be applied continuously throughout in order to maximize its value at any given time.
Paul Kallmes earned his BSEE at Northeastern University and an MPA in Risk Assessment of Environmental Health Hazards at the University of Washington.
Languages:
German
Russian
SENIOR ADVISOR
Brian Sun
Senior Advisor & Strategic Consultant with Yorkdale Partners, (New York)
Brian is responsible for strategic and complex, cross border transactions between North America and Asia. He has deep experience in buyside/sellside, joint venture and funding engagements. He covers all of the major Asian buyside opportunities for Yorkdale.
Brian brings over 15 years experience in major cross border advisory and is responsible for Asia Pacific coverage. Brian was formerly Managing Director, M&A at Fosun (New York), a major Chinese conglomerate covering the financial services and technology sectors. Prior to this, he was Executive Director of M&A Advisory for China Merchants Bank (New York), where he covered industrials, healthcare, diversified and financial services sectors.
Brian was also, Senior Vice President for Lazard Ltd where he advised on major cross border transaction between North American and EU Corporations with Chinese counter parties in the diversified industries sector.
Brian was also, Director at AES (Hong Kong), one of the largest alternative energy companies where he originated and executed a number of major M&A transactions.
Brian has his MBA in Finance from Duke University and is a graduate of Beijing Foreign Studies Universities with a BA in International Commerce. He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst, CFA since 2008.
SENIOR ADVISOR
Brian Sun
Senior Advisor & Strategic Consultant with Yorkdale Partners, (New York)
Brian is responsible for strategic and complex, cross border transactions between North America and Asia. He has deep experience in buyside/sellside, joint venture and funding engagements. He covers all of the major Asian buyside opportunities for Yorkdale.
Brian brings over 15 years experience in major cross border advisory and is responsible for Asia Pacific coverage. Brian was formerly Managing Director, M&A at Fosun (New York), a major Chinese conglomerate covering the financial services and technology sectors. Prior to this, he was Executive Director of M&A Advisory for China Merchants Bank (New York), where he covered industrials, healthcare, diversified and financial services sectors.
Brian was also, Senior Vice President for Lazard Ltd where he advised on major cross border transaction between North American and EU Corporations with Chinese counter parties in the diversified industries sector.
Brian was also, Director at AES (Hong Kong), one of the largest alternative energy companies where he originated and executed a number of major M&A transactions.
Brian has his MBA in Finance from Duke University and is a graduate of Beijing Foreign Studies Universities with a BA in International Commerce. He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst, CFA since 2008.
Mandarin
Cantonese
Languages:
SENIOR ADVISOR
Brian Sun
Senior Advisor & Strategic Consultant with Yorkdale Partners, (New York)
Brian is responsible for strategic and complex, cross border transactions between North America and Asia. He has deep experience in buyside/sellside, joint venture and funding engagements. He covers all of the major Asian buyside opportunities for Yorkdale.
Brian brings over 15 years experience in major cross border advisory and is responsible for Asia Pacific coverage. Brian was formerly Managing Director, M&A at Fosun (New York), a major Chinese conglomerate covering the financial services and technology sectors. Prior to this, he was Executive Director of M&A Advisory for China Merchants Bank (New York), where he covered industrials, healthcare, diversified and financial services sectors.
Brian was also, Senior Vice President for Lazard Ltd where he advised on major cross border transaction between North American and EU Corporations with Chinese counter parties in the diversified industries sector.
Brian was also, Director at AES (Hong Kong), one of the largest alternative energy companies where he originated and executed a number of major M&A transactions.
Brian has his MBA in Finance from Duke University and is a graduate of Beijing Foreign Studies Universities with a BA in International Commerce. He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst, CFA since 2008.
Mandarin
Cantonese
Languages:
OUR ANALYSTS.
Fei Tao
Analyst with Yorkdale Partners, Toronto
Fei is a second-year student at University of Toronto Rotman Commerce with a majors in Finance and Economics.
He strives to to embark on the path of entrepreneurship by becoming involved in the Rotman Commerce Entrepreneurship Organization as an events manager. He is also a newsroom analyst for The Uptick, an University of Toronto’s undergraduate journal to promote novel ideas in finance, economics, innovation and technology. Fei is also the Scholarship Chair at Sigma Chi Fraternity, Beta Omega Chapter where he manages over $5000 scholarship. He completed the Financial Modeling courses by The Marquee Group and Bloomberg Market Concepts.
He interned at HQ Capital as a private equity research analyst in the last summer.
Fei was a Varsity Handball player and enjoys playing basketball and soccer. He is also involved in music production and enjoys cooking in his free time.
Languages:
Mandarin
Jimmy Wang
Analyst with Yorkdale Partners, Vancouver
Jimmy Wang is a second-year finance student at the University of Western Ontario. He plans on entering the Honors Business Administration (HBA) program at Ivey Business School in the upcoming year.
Jimmy’s interest in finance started when he opened a stock portfolio on his 18th birthday. He began slowly building his portfolio while teaching himself about value investing. On-campus, he is the president of Global China Connection, a global organization with a focus on business. In addition, he is involved with Western Investment Club and Western Capital Markets. Outside of campus, he writes M&A and industry reports for Focus Finance, a student-run finance organization. He has broadened his understanding of capital markets by completing the FMVA (Financial Modelling Valuation Analyst) certification and Bloomberg Market Concepts.
In a professional setting, Jimmy has experience working in private equity at Silverstone Capital and W Holdings. He has also worked at a challenger bank startup named Sync.
Jimmy is an avid fan of the Vancouver Canucks and loves playing basketball. In his free time, he enjoys reading Greek Mythology and learning new recipes.
OUR ADVISORY BOARD.
Tom Richards
Tom has 25 years in senior management roles in multiple manufacturing organizations. He has undertaken leadership roles in Operations, Sales, Marketing and Strategic planning. Tom has M&A experience with SMEs and has worked for early stage tech companies as an employee, board member and advisor and has raised multiple $MM for acquisitions and business development. He has an excellent record of generating superior returns for investors.
Tom was President of E Craftsmen Corporation and Power Vector for 10 years and joined LumaStream as Chief Operating Officer in 2011. He has developed new sales channels and markets in North America and Europe and has taken the lead for strategic sourcing initiatives in Asia. Channel development experience includes OEM, wholesale hardware, and wholesale electrical. He has been the catalyst for key strategic initiatives including partnerships, acquisitions and outsourcing, and has a history of consistently generating revenue growth and profit.
Professor Knud B. Jensen
Knud is a professor in the Department of Entrepreneurship and Strategy at Ted Rogers School of Business Management at Ryerson University. He specializes in growing companies, and is an author and co-author of several books, chapters in books, and papers and articles.
With two colleagues, he spent two years on a project, "Growing Ontario Firms," sponsored by the Ontario Government. He is currently working on a project developing a business model for small and medium professional service organizations for sustainable growth, and writing a chapter on decision making to create value for a book. He has worked with both the Ontario and Federal Governments as a consultant in the area of growing small and medium companies.
As a mentor, advisor, board member, and consultant, Knud has helped many companies grow and become successful.
Sang-Ho Kim
Sang-Ho Kim is an electrical engineer by profession. He has many years of experience as an engineer in major manufacturing companies. He has also held various management positions throughout his career in project managing large scale projects; eCommerce management; building effective teams for marketing/technical; and managing public companies. He has worked for: Schneider Electric, ABB (Asea Brown Boveri) and Canada Wire.