Tobias Read Email & Phone Number

Cypress, Tx, Us

I spent almost 30 years working as an owner, a seller, a buyer and a CEO of multiple mid-market companies with Private Equity sponsorship. During that time I completed multiple transactions and acquisitions and I saw at first hand the positive power that a Private Equity partnership can bring and how with the right deal Founders and Owners can achieve substantially more together than they can alone and I enjoy seeing this success unfold.I also have founded business and through organic growth, mergers and acquisitions I built one company from $300m to $1.3bn of annual revenue.Having hung up my CEO boots, I'm now focused on deal origination as this role is something I'm passionate about and which I enjoy. I founded AQRA Group as a buy-side deal origination agency that works with Private Equity firms to assist them find great companies in the US with revenues of up to $500m. AQRA focuses on sourcing off-market deals and is industry agnostic, but with specific expertise in the business services, engineering, technology and software sectors. AQRA provides introductory services and is independent and non-advisory.I bring added value to the process for Owners, Management Teams and Private Equity companies as I'm not a typical buy-side agent. Instead I've stood in the shoes of sellers and executives so I can relate to the their perspective as they consider a partnership with a Private Equity group be they founders looking to sell or owners looking for capital to help them realize their wider vision or management teams looking to complete a buy-out and become owners themselves.

Houston, Texas, Us

AQRA International is a fast growth technical recruitment company focusing on direct hire for professional grade engineers. AQRA operates from London UK and Houston TX.

Houston, Texas, Us

TUYA technologies was an innovative marketplace platform looking to disrupt the same day express delivery marketplace across the major 50 US cities. I was a shareholder, a member of the board and EXEC VP.I was instrumental in raising $35 million of seed funding over 5 rounds between 2016 and 2020 from a combination of High Net Worth Individuals and institutional investors. We then built a disruptive Marketplace Platform tailored specifically for the B2B same day express delivery market. We then completed our first 4 self-sourced acquisitions and successfully launched in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Austin at which point TUYA had over 500 Independent Contractor Drivers working at full capacity.We had plans to acquire a further 25 operators in each of the 50 major MSAs and then IPO. We were on track with LOIs in place and growing strong, but then at the point of our next funding round in March 2020 we got destroyed by Covid as the capital markets dried up at a critical juncture.

Houston, Tx, Us

I was instrumental in forming Airswift in 2016 with the merger of Swift (where I was CEO from Aug 2010 to Jan 2016) and Air Energi. We created the #1 global player in the oil and gas staffing sector: a company with circa 7,000 contractors, a turnover of over $1.3bn and operations in over 50 countries. After the merger I sat on the board for 18 months till TUYA became too time consuming.

Swift Worldwide Resources (now Airswift) was the premier global provider of professional grade contingent labor to the global Oil & Gas sector. I joined in August 2010 as CEO and minority owner following a high profile issue which very nearly destroyed the company. We completed a very tough turnaround which involved restructuring the company and the debt facilities and stabilized the company within 6 months. We then grew our contractor base from just over 1,500 and by 2013 we employed 3,000 professionals engineers. In October 2013 I completed a successful exit which involved changing the initial UK PE company for a US based PE company. I stayed on as CEO then in 2016 completed a major merger. Airswift was born and had 7,000 employees, over $1.3b in annual revenues and operations in over 50 countries.After the merger I became a Non Exec Director of Airswift.

Nottingham, England, Gb

Road Angel was a provider of dash-board technology to the UK automotive sector. The company had been purchased by Private Equity in 2006 with backing from Lloyds bank which owned primary debt and mezzanine facilities. By early 2010, Road Angel had broken its covenants and was on the point of insolvency.I was appointed by Lloyd's bank as Chairman and my task was to safeguard Lloyds' facilities. I worked with Road Angel for 18 months. I changed the CEO and with the new CEO I helped restructure operations, improve service quality and launch a new product. Once stabilized, I worked with the CEO to find a buyer.In Feb 2012 we completed a successful transaction which returned 100% of the principal and deferred interest to the bank.

Troy, Michigan, Us

Talascend started as a corporate spin-out with backing from LDC. I was CEO and a shareholder alongside LDC and the original corporate owner.Talascend traded under 2 separate but related divisionsEPCglobal was a staffing business which focused on the blue chip EPC space with a focus on professional grade engineers. It operated across the UK, the US, India and the middle east.Vislient was a proprietary Tech / MSP service that Talascend used to managed the recruitment function and interface with external agencies for its strategic EPC clientsIn 3 years annual revenues increased by 125% to $150m and contractors employed increased to just over 1,000.In 2008 I sold the company to the MPS group from Michigan.

Gb

IntroNet was SaaS company that provided recruitment and staffing software solutions to global blue chip companies. I led a buy-out from the founder and was CEO and owner.Before I took over, IntroNet was in a very poor state and on the verge of insolvency as a result of poor leadership by the founder. This was a classic turnaround which took about 6 months before we turned our attention to growing revenues and profitability. I managed an exit in Sept 2004 in private transaction.

Professional Services / Business Consulting / ERP SolutionsSubstantial turnaroundExit to Ceder Group UKMultiple self-sourced acquisitions

Mba, Business Administration And Management, General

Bachelor Of Engineering (B.Eng.), Production Engineering