There is no committee.
Daelus is one operator with private, permanent capital. The person who answers the phone is the person who signs the deal, and the person who shows up on Monday.
Dillon Friedman
Founder. Fort Worth, Texas.
Fourth-generation Fort Worth. Ran a company in Minneapolis, with the scars and the stories to prove it. There's an MBA and six years of consulting behind me too, though neither ever billed an order or kept a good tech from quitting. Twenty-plus years with my high school sweetheart, three kids, and an old chocolate lab. Glad to be back in Texas.
Icosian Capital acquired APA Medical, a home-medical business in Minneapolis. I ran it as CEO. Rebuilt how orders moved, how people were paid, and how the phones got answered. Revenue grew 60%. Days from order to invoice fell 72%. Turnover fell 50% — the number I care most about.
Ran Austin operations end to end — crews, housekeeping, supplies, maintenance, everything between a guest's check-in and their checkout. Grew from eight units to over 270 in about a year. Then to headquarters, forecasting labor for 30+ cities and two call centers.
Mergers and acquisitions, then the integration work afterward, for technology, media, and telecom clients. The part I liked was the integration — where the plan meets the people who have to run it.
National security work in Washington. Assessed whether a foreign telecom manufacturer's equipment belonged in American networks; CFIUS accepted the recommendation.
Why I left the advice business.
In consulting you hand over a plan and go home. Whether it works depends on people you may never speak to again. I was on track to make that a career before deciding I wanted my name on the outcome — to build something that adds to the economy rather than comments on it.
My first years of operating taught me how to think about execution. Whether the room gets turned over. Whether the orders get billed. Whether the good people stay. Whether anyone owns a process when it breaks at four in the afternoon. A small company has none of the advantages a large one has, which is the entire point. More from less.
It is my right to be uncommon, and people who came before me toiled endlessly to make that right possible. I have done it once. I love the grind. I am doing it again.
What we won't trade away.
The company was here before us. The job is to build on it.
We do not buy companies in order to cut them. The team you built is most of what we are buying.
You get a real number early, and we do not move it without a real reason.
Permanent means permanent.
A fund has a clock. Ten years in, someone has to sell your company to pay the investors back whether or not selling is good for the business. That is not a criticism of funds. It is how they are built.
Daelus has no clock. We buy to hold. The only reason we would ever sell is if we were no longer the right owner.