Our professionals have great vision, dedication, a contagious passion and a tremendous resolve, all key characteristics as it takes a lot to get a venture off the ground or to the next level. A dedicated energetic team of experienced executives is critical to all businesses.
At GroundWork Equity our partners have all been founders of companies and have decades of operating in CEO, COO, CFO or CMO positions and significant venture experience. They are strategic thinkers and execution specialists that seek a leadership role in supporting other entrepreneurs by applying business experiences to avoiding costly mistakes, having an open and honest approach and utilizing a wealth of strategic partnerships to cultivate and quickly accelerate the business.
Our management associates build businesses ...by rolling up our sleeves, digging-in, and producing results. Much like our partners, management associates have decades of operating experience, are dedicated, driven, and have a contagious passion.
Michael Edell is a Founder and Managing Partner of GroundWork Equity, LLC., founded in early 2006. He is responsible for the firm’s strategic planning and investment policies and is also involved with all our portfolio companies, providing corporate growth and development leadership which has lead to high-value exit strategies.
Michael is also the CEO and Chairman of Interneer.com, a privately held software company which provides Human Centric BPM software solutions which lets companies configure process driven web-based applications with integrated workflow at the speed of business, without programming. Michael is also the Chairman of TKO Electronics a technology asset life cycle management company providing new and used whole unit and spare parts for computer, network and peripheral equipment. In addition, he’s the founder (and current Chairman of the Board) of Warehouse Auction Centers, Inc. (“WAC”) a privately held online e-commerce site for collectible items. WAC is one of the leading online e-commerce companies specializing in collectible merchandise. WAC was founded to tap into the multi-billion dollar collectible market place and has become one of the largest suppliers of this type of product.
Michael is the General Partner of Warp Nine Partners, LLC, a real estate partnership. The company owns and operates several commercial properties in the Ventura County and Los Angeles areas. Michael serves on the board of PeopleSupport (Nasdaq:PSPT), a leading business process outsourcing (BPO) provider since 2002 and Altametrics Inc. (privately held), a leading provider of hosted enterprise solutions to the restaurant industry in addition to the advisory boards of numerous other high technology companies.
From September 1983 to February 2003, Michael was the President and Chief Executive Officer of eLabor.com, a privately held technology company that developed workforce management software both as licensed and hosted solutions. He spun off the project management division of eLabor which was acquired by Microsoft Corporation in 2002 and then sold the company to ADP in 2003.
Michael has also received his ISS Director accreditation for public company board of directors from UCLA.
Contact Michael Edell
818.707.0074 ext 102
Patricia Spencer has been a marketing specialist since 1991. She has been closely involved with more than a dozen ventures, creating corporate branding and identity, strategic marketing plans and provided execution services. She joined the GroundWork Equity team in early 2006. She has lead a number of marketing teams within several privately held companies such as Interneer, Inc. an enterprise business process management software provider, and Warehouse Auction Centers, an online e-commerce site for collectible items, among others.
She started her career when she launched both, Body by Jake Enterprises, LLC a health and fitness company and Body by Jake Productions, a television production company specializing in direct response and fitness. As a part of her responsibilities she served as a producer of two hundred plus product and fitness shows for Body by Jake and Fit TV, the world’s first health and fitness television network.
Also an entrepreneur, Patricia is the founder of MaddieBrit Products, LLC, an environmentally friendly line of household and personal care products and founding partner for Super Soccer Skills, a partnership developing youth soccer instructional DVDs and products.
Contact Patricia Spencer
818.707.0074 ext 103
Adam Tepper is a founding Principal of GroundWork Equity, LLC where he brings nearly 12 years experience in finance, capital markets and strategic development. Adam is particularly skilled in structuring highly leveraged transactions and building complex businesses from the ground up. At GroundWork, his responsibilities include originating, structuring and negotiating engagements with businesses ranging in size from concept to $50MM in revenues across a variety of industry sectors including, but not limited to, K-12 education, consumer beverage, new media and defense procurement. Adam is also responsible for developing and optimizing all functions within select companies of the GroundWork portfolio.
While at GroundWork, Adam was one of three co-founders and CFO of Perceval Interactive Media, LLC / TeleGalería LLC, an all-Spanish multi-media consumer sales network similar to QVC. His responsibilities included building and managing the financial, sales and distribution systems as well as establishing the strategic and tactical plans for the business plans.
Adam is also the CFO of International Studio Group, Inc. (ISG), a commercial real estate developer building mixed-use media campuses anchored by state-of-the-art sound stages. In addition to providing strategic advice to ISG, his responsibilities include sourcing, structuring and efficiently deploying expansion and internal capital.
Adam graduated in 1996 from The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania with concentrations in finance and entrepreneurial management. He then co-founded Jet Entertainment Corp. (JEC), a music-based entertainment company which consisted of an independent record label, a music video production company, two weekly public-access music video shows and a video editing/duplication business.
Upon passing control of JEC to his partner, Adam went to work as an investment banker at Prudential Securities (Prudential) in the asset-backed finance group. During his three years at Prudential, Adam structured and raised nearly $5 billion in asset-backed securities (ABS) backed by both consumer as well as commercial assets. Additionally, he helped to structure and set-up a joint-venture between Prudential and Charles A. Koppleman (former chairman of BMG/EMI Records), CAK Universal Credit Corp., to provide financing to entertainers by taking future royalties as collateral against loans.
In April 2000, Adam was part of a select group of bankers that were hired away from Prudential by Credit Suisse First Boston (CSFB). Over the next five years, Adam applied his expertise in structured finance to the aircraft leasing, airline and rail industries during which time he helped to generate in excess of $100 million in revenue to CSFB through a variety of corporate finance activities. These projects included the structuring and sale of over $5 billion in aircraft-backed debt and equity securities, the $3+ billion restructuring of Brazil’s largest airline (TAM Airlines) and a $500+ million, out-of-court restructuring of Pegasus Aviation, Inc. which included a $250 million private equity recapitalization by OakTree Capital. Pegasus Aviation was subsequently sold to Terra Firma for approximately $5 billion.
Contact Adam Tepper
818.707.0074 ext. 107
Jack Karabees, Principle at GroundWork Equity and Vice President of Sales at Interneer, has spent the past 20 years successfully establishing development capital and developing, organizing and executing high-growth sales and marketing plans for start-up and turn-around operations in the high technology and real estate sectors.
Prior to joining Interneer, Mr. Karabees, as Executive Vice President of Sales for Hudson Capital, a $1B+ real estate development firm, was responsible for all domestic and international sales and funding relationships for the company. Jack came to Hudson Capital from Katalyst Securities, where he held the position of Senior Vice President / Investment Banking.
Preceding his time at Katalyst, Jack was with eLabor, a provider of Enterprise Workforce, Project and Recruitment Management software sold to the Fortune 1000. He joined eLabor in 1999 and served as Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing through eLabor’s successful bi-divisional acquisitions by Microsoft, and ADP.
Prior to that time, from 1987 through 1999, Mr. Karabees was employed by Data Net Corporation, a Florida-based high technology company. He joined the company in 1987 as Regional Sales Manager and took on positions of increasing responsibility to become Vice President of Sales and Marketing.
Jack served honorably in the United States Air Force. He is a member and serves on the Board of Directors of New World Angels, an angel investment fund and remains active within the high-tech investment community. Jack is also a contributor to and Board Member of the Enterprise Development Corporation of Florida.
Contact Jack Karabees
786.683.7900
Ron Means is a Founding Partner at GroundWork Equity, LLC Ron has an in-depth knowledge of business operations, growth strategies, domestic and international distribution and has a strong sense for understanding complex market opportunities. A well-respected business veteran, he is known for his leadership and management expertise in the electronics and technology markets
Ron previously served as Chief Executive Officer for Market Scan Information Systems. Market Scan is a private, family founded business with over 2000 retail automobile dealer customers and provides finance, customer service and sales management software and hardware systems.
Prior to joining Market Scan, Ron served as president and chief operating officer for Quantum Digital Solutions, an applied sciences firm that developed a multi-patented secure digital communications and content retention technology. The company raised initial and secondary funding and was successful in completing a significant strategic partnership within the health care industry. This first deal was worth over $40,000,000 in revenue and equity.
Ron served as President of JBL Professional, a Harman International and Fortune 500 Company. During his tenure at JBL, He obtained record-breaking revenues and profit levels and created a dominant market share in each of the company's business segments.
Earlier in his career, Ron founded a retail consumer electronic business and has also held various positions with Altec Lansing, a leading manufacturer of consumer and professional audio speakers and electronics. Throughout his career, he has served on boards for a number of corporations.
Contact Ron Means
805.402.1883
Peter Cowen is a Senior Partner of GroundWork Equity, LLC. He specializes in assisting local emerging technology and scalable service companies with strong growth potential. During his career, he has advised more than 200 startups, helped raise over $150 million for early stage businesses, taken executive operating positions, hired key executives, advisors and board members, as well found investors for these ventures.
Named by the Los Angeles Business Journal as one of the top 25 angel investors in Los Angeles, Mr. Cowen has invested in more than 30 companies and served on over a dozen Board of Directors. He was one of the first members of the Tech Coast Angels in Los Angeles, which is the largest angel investing group in the country.
Examples of his experience include cofounding TransDecisions Inc (venture-back software for fleet route optimization), Biometric ID Inc. (fingerprint ID security) and Data Voice Solutions Inc (networking software). He developed their business plans, held executive management positions, assisted in raising more than $20 million in capital, recruited and secured experienced management personnel and board members. He was integral in all three companies being acquired by major entities. He also held sales and marketing positions with Hewlett Packard and Unilever.
Mr. Cowen founded the annual University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Entrepreneurial Capital Conference, and served as its chairman for seven years. He is a frequent speaker and has lectured on entrepreneurship at UCLA, the University of Southern California and Pepperdine University. He has been quoted on entrepreneurship in the Los Angeles Times, Business Week, Red Herring and the Los Angeles Business Journal.
He is currently on the board of directors of the UCLA Anderson Graduate School of Business (AGSM) Alumni. He has recently accepted a position to join the UCLA AGSM faculty on a part time basis starting in the summer of 2008.
Mr. Cowen has an MBA in finance from UCLA AGSM and a BA in Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. He is married with 2 kids (ages 9 and 10) and lives in Los Angeles.
Contact Peter Cowen
310.234.3277
