https://www.ibj.com/articles/the-big-shift

At Carmel-based private equity firm CID Capital, Managing Partner Steve Cobb said moving meetings online has its advantages. “I almost say it’s better because the amount of interaction increased so much.”

The firm focuses on acquiring lower-middle-market U.S.- and Canada-based companies, with a focus on consumer products, industrial products and business services.

CID’s travel schedule got cut in half last year, Cobb said, but the total number of meetings tripled or quadrupled because online meetings are so much easier to arrange.

“We found ourselves getting great insight from the management teams that we were talking with and the founders that we were talking with,” he said. Online meetings “really allowed business to continue at a level that was probably unimaginable five years ago.”

CID’s Cobb said he’s “pretty bullish on where 2021 would go,” especially since his firm concentrates on acquiring firms from owners and founders who are looking to retire.

“There’s, in our view, always retirements,” Cobb said. “There’s no way to slow the clock. We all get older.”