Gryphon Investors has made a majority investment in PestRoutes, a provider of business management software used in the pest control sector and other similar verticals.
PestRoutes cloud-based and mobile products are used by pest control and other field service companies – such as lawn care and pool servicing businesses – to automate their operations including route optimization, technician tracking, customer communications, scheduling, and billing. PestRoutes, led by CEO Patrick McKittrick, has more than 1,500 customers and is headquartered north of Dallas in McKinney, Texas.
PestRoutes was co-founded by Jared Green in 2012 to help with his door-to-door pest control sales efforts. After realizing the existing pest control ERP systems were expensive, dated and bulky, Mr. Green focused on building a software platform that was mobile and easy-to-use by pest control businesses of all sizes. In March 2018, San Francisco-based Mainsail Partners made a growth investment in the company. Now, in partnership with Gryphon, Mainsail and Mr. Green are retaining minority equity stakes in PestRoutes.
“We have enjoyed rapid growth under our partnership with Mainsail and we are now excited to work with Gryphon as we pursue further expansion of functionality to our existing customers and markets as well as products serving new industries within field services,” said Mr. McKittrick.
“PestRoutes serves a number of large and growing field services markets with complex software needs that are not being met by existing solutions,” said Jon Cheek, a principal at Gryphon. “PestRoutes not only addresses the complicated requirements of field services companies of all sizes, but it does so through the use of modern, easy-to-use software complemented by high-quality customer service, which together provide tremendous value and a superior customer experience.”
San Francisco-based Gryphon makes leveraged acquisitions and growth investments in middle-market companies. The firm invests from $100 million to $300 million of capital in companies with enterprise values ranging from $100 million to $500 million. Sectors of interest include business services, consumer products and services, healthcare, industrial growth, and software. In July 2019 the firm held a final closing of Gryphon Partners V LP at its hard cap of $2.1 billion. The new fund was oversubscribed and exceeded its original target of $1.5 billion.
With the close of this investment, three Gryphon executives will join the PestRoutes board of directors – President Nick Orum, Partner Carl Theobald, and Mr. Cheek – joining Mainsail Partner Jason Payne, who remains on the board.
“Through our multiple prior investments in field services and route-based companies, as well as our proactive sector research leading to those investments, we’ve consistently found that the field services industry has been underserved by modern technology that’s capable of managing the complexities of these distributed business models from end-to-end,” said Mr. Orum. “The rapid growth and high customer retention of PestRoutes are key indicators that the company has cracked the code on providing high-quality software that offers meaningful value to its customers.”
San Francisco-based Mainsail Partners invests from $10 million to $75 million in US and Canadian-headquartered business-to-business software companies that have revenues of $4 million to $25 million.
San Mateo-based Arbor Advisors was the financial advisor to PestRoutes.
© 2020 Private Equity Professional | January 29, 2020