Mark Patey started Prodigy Engineering in 2010 to help companies leverage hybrid engine technology. Four short years later, Patey accepted a multi-million dollar offer to buy the company.

Prodigy Engineering is the latest in Patey’s pattern of starting businesses for the purposes of scaling them and then quickly flipping them. Patey has flipped six companies, and his approach could be considered the counterbalance to the prevailing view that businesses should be built to last a lifetime.

When you get to know Patey, his compacted timelines start to make sense. He – like so many successful entrepreneurs – suffers from ADHD, a blessing and at times a curse.  Patey credits his ADHD with much of his success at selling businesses.

Andrew Yang had built Manhattan GMAT into an $11 million business when Kaplan Test Prep, an 800-pound gorilla in the education business, threatened legal action against his company.
 
Rather than react defensively, Yang sought to build a relationship with Kaplan executives, who would eventually go on to buy Manhattan GMAT for more than 8 times EBITDA.
 
To see how Yang turned a potential crisis into a clean offer of more than 8 times EBITDA.

Derek Sivers sold CD Baby for $22 million dollars and decided to do something interesting with the money.

As an independent musician, Derek Sivers was blocked from selling his music through mainstream distribution channels, so he decided to start a company that would give his band, and other artists like him, a way to sell their music online.

The business grew as Sivers entered into distribution deals with iTunes and Amazon.

Ten years later, Sivers sold CD Baby for a cool $22 million dollars – and you’ll never believe what he did with the money.

Small service-based businesses are typically not worth very much, but Walter Bergeron made one simple change to his business model that garnered a $10 M acquisition offer.

Bergeron started a small company servicing circuit boards for large food processing plants. It was a “break/fix” business with lumpy demand and cash flow.

Struggling to grow, Bergeron starting offering a membership model where instead of calling when they had a machine to repair, subscribers paid a monthly fee so they could have their circuit boards serviced at any time.

The switch to a membership model transformed the business and Bergeron quickly grew the company to $7 million in annual sales, at which point he was offered $10 million to sell it.