John Hill, Managing Partner, Hyde Park Capital

August 2026 —Invest: spoke with John Hill, Managing Partner of Hyde Park Capital, about how interest rates and policy uncertainty are shaping middle-market M&A. The firm’s national expansion and selective use of AI are strengthening its work with founder-owned businesses as activity accelerates. “We now have about 25 bankers, and our goal is to grow toward 50 over time,” Hill said.

How would you characterize the past year for Hyde Park Capital, and what does it say about broader conditions in the M&A space?

2025 ended up being more challenging than expected. Interest rates remained elevated longer than anticipated, and trade and tariff initiatives added uncertainty, which weighed on deal volume in the first half of the year. For us, that resulted in a slower start even though the underlying fundamentals of many of our clients were still strong. By the fourth quarter, however, we saw conditions improve meaningfully. Rates began trending down, confidence returned, and business performance stabilized.

Many M&A professionals — investment bankers, private equity firms, deal attorneys and accountants — feel aligned that 2026 could be the first real upcycle since deal activity peaked in 2021. We believe it has the potential to be a record year.

What recent transactions position Hyde Park Capital for growth?

Healthcare has been our most active vertical. We continue to see significant consolidation in physician practice management, particularly in orthopedics but also across a range of specialties. For instance, we closed a major orthopedic transaction last year in Wisconsin and are closing another sizable deal in New York. Home health and hospice remain strong as well. Another transaction we sold was the largest home healthcare company in Florida in 2024 and we continue working with providers across the Southeast. Behavioral health is another area of momentum; we are launching engagements in addiction treatment centers. We are also closing transactions in medical transportation in the Northeast and Southeast.

Within healthcare technology, we remain active in remote patient monitoring (RPM), telehealth, chronic care management, and revenue cycle management. In 2025, we sold an RPM business and were hired by an innovative telehealth provider. We are also marketing a growing medical device manufacturer with significant scale.

Beyond healthcare, we continue to operate across software and tech-enabled services; business services such as roofing, landscaping, HVAC, electrical and concrete restoration; and niche industrial manufacturing and distribution. In consumer and animal health, we have built a deep track record — selling around 20 pet-vet-related companies to date and currently marketing additional veterinary platforms and related businesses. The combination of healthcare, technology, business, and industrial services continues to drive our pipeline.

Hyde Park Capital is expanding nationally while maintaining a strong Florida base. How is that expanded footprint strengthening your work in high-growth markets?

Our philosophy is to focus on sectors where we have deep expertise and to place talent in markets experiencing strong economic and population growth. We now have about 25 bankers, and our goal is to grow toward 50 over time. That scale allows us to build dedicated sector teams in healthcare, technology, business and industrial services, consumer and financial services

Geographically, we are concentrating on markets where our clients are expanding. Florida remains our headquarters and a major growth engine, but we see similar dynamics in Nashville. Nashville, for example, is attracting significant technology and healthcare investments, including Oracle’s major campus development, creating opportunities that align closely with our focus areas. We ultimately expect to expand our Florida presence as well, potentially adding a Miami office in the future to complement our Tampa headquarters.

We are also growing selectively in San Francisco. Despite regulatory and tax challenges, California remains a large, innovative market. 

How are you leveraging AI to enhance client experience and internal efficiency?

AI is becoming an important tool across our workflow. One of the first areas where we’ve integrated it is buyer identification. Historically, we combined proprietary data with third-party databases to build buyer lists. Now we can supplement those lists with AI-generated suggestions, which often surface logical acquirers we may not have initially considered. We still validate everything internally, but AI enhances our reach and efficiency.

We also use AI for research, topic exploration, and early drafting work. Over time, as systems learn from our processes and data structures, we expect AI to support more analytics and valuation modeling. That will help accelerate parts of the diligence and marketing cycle, enabling our team to focus more on strategic andfinancial buyer outreach.

Outside of AI, we continue investing in our CRM and in outreach technologies. Our direct-outreach programs help us identify and engage with target  founder- and family-owned businesses generating roughly $3 million to $15 million of EBITDA. These systems ensure we remain visible, informative, and ready when they choose to explore a transaction.

From your perspective, what major trends are shaping middle-market M&A and valuation?

The most important trend is a shift in interest rates. As rates decline and the cost of capital comes down, buyers — especially private equity firms pursuing buy-and-build strategies — can pay more for strong companies. That supports higher valuations and encourages more owners to consider a sale.

The second trend is business confidence. For much of 2025, uncertainty made people cautious. As visibility improves, buyers are more aggressive and business owners are more willing to pursue acquisitions or explore exit options. High-quality companies receive particularly strong attention in this more selective M&A environment. For example,  we recently ran a process for an attractive company that generated 39 offers, which speaks to the amount of capital waiting to be deployed and the scarcity of exceptional assets. In competitive processes, readiness, data organization, and management quality make a real difference in valuation outcomes.

Looking ahead over the next two to three years, what is your outlook for middle-market M&A, and how do you expect Hyde Park Capital to evolve within that environment?

Much of our work involves founder- and family-owned businesses led by baby boomers who are increasingly evaluating succession, retirement, or liquidity options. These companies may generate $5 million, $10 million or $20 million plus in profit, and without a clear next generation of leadership, many will come to market. That is a strong long-term trend.

Private equity firms have pent-up selling needs after several years of lower activity. As they bring more portfolio companies to market, larger investment banks will focus on billion-dollar-plus transactions, leaving a significant opportunity for boutique firms like ours to serve businesses in the $25u million to $500 million value range.

We also expect deal timelines and risk perceptions to normalize. Recent years have stretched transactions to seven, eight, or nine months because buyers pursued exhaustive data requests. As markets accelerate, competitive pressure will require buyers to move faster and focus on the information that truly matters. Once you have roughly 80% of the key data, you can typically make a well-informed decision. A more balanced approach can reduce deal fatigue, shorten timelines, and support a healthier transaction environment.