866-232-1031
Welcome to
Avala BDC
Capital for Growing Companies
Avala BDC is a business development company - a form of specialty finance company designed to facilitate capital formation primarily for small and middle-market companies - with an investment strategy targeted to maximize the total return to our stockholders in the form of current income and, to a lesser extent, capital appreciation through a variety of debt and equity investments.
About
Our goal at Avala BDC is to help middle-market companies leverage their success by providing debt and equity financing options that best fit their operational and growth needs. We understand the constraints faced by banking and institutional lenders and seek to eliminate the structural barriers to debt and equity financings. We intend to become a long term partner by providing material managerial support and operational assistance as needed.
Avala BDC is an externally managed, closed-end, management investment company that has elected to be regulated as a business development company under the Investment Company Act of 1940 and as a regulated investment company (RIC) for tax purposes. We expect our primary focus to be on middle-market companies in the United States.
Our preferred investment vehicles will be senior secured loans, which includes first-lien, second-lien, and unitranche loans, and subordinated loans. In appropriate cases, we may invest in warrants and other minority equity securities. In each instance, we intend to provide highly customized financing solutions to companies that may not have access to traditional banking and institutional lenders.
Our investment objective is to provide our shareholders with current income and, to a lesser extent, capital appreciation, primarily through debt investments and, in lesser circumstances, equity investments.
We believe that our primary focus on lending to the middle-market and companies offers potential advantages to our stockholders, including attractive yields, increasingly stabilizing environment, direct access to borrower management and improved information flow.
Our investment activities are managed by our investment advisor, Atomi Financial Group, Inc. To learn more about Atomi Financial Group please visit https://www.atomifinancial.com/.
Avala BDC
Executive Team
David Abell
Chief Executive Officer & Chairman
With a background in securities law, finance, M&A, venture capital and private equity and starting and funding his own high tech company (TriLumina), Mr. Abell is passionate about serving as a partner to successful companies with particularized needs for debt financing options.
Kirk Otis
Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Otis is a founding member of the Avala BDC team and brings a long history of success in a number of industry sectors. In addition to his long history in private equity, financial services, corporate finance and corporate development, Mr. Otis served as CFO and then CEO of TriLumina Corp.
Sander Ressler
Chief Compliance Officer
As our Chief Compliance Officer, Mr. Ressler brings a wealth of regulatory and operational experience as a state regulator, as an industry expert an industry in RIA/BD compliance and as founder and managing director of his financial services compliance firm, Essential Edge Compliance Outsourcing Services, LLC.
Avala BDC
Independent Directors
William Perez
Independent Director
Mr. Perez brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to the Avala Board as a seasoned securities attorney with considerable experience in private offerings, corporate securities, debt and equity financings and complex transactions. Mr. Perez has founded, funded and exited a number of companies across various industries.
Michael Hoag
Independent Director
Mr. Hoag is an operations expert having served as the director of operations and manufacturing in a number of technology companies including semiconductor lasers, wireless communication platforms, network infrastructure deployment in telecom, defense, aerospace and automotive. He brings a wealth of management and operational expertise to us and our portfolio companies.
Mr. Rishel is an experienced banking and commercial lending professional having served in various capacities and on numerous finance, lending, and credit committees over his career. His professional experience is directly related to his core duties as an advisor to the Board and the Investment Committee.
Dennis Rishel
Senior Advisor to
Board and Investment Committee
Avala BDC
Investment Advisor
ATOMI FINANCIAL GROUP, INC.
Registered Investment Advisor
Atomi Financial Group, Inc. (CRD # 171787/SEC#:801-126007)(“Atomi”), a California S-Corporation, is a registered investment adviser under the Investment Advisors Act of 1940. Atomi serves as our investment adviser pursuant to an investment advisory agreement.
Darren Whissen is a principal and chief compliance officer of Atomi. Mr. Whissen’s career in financial services spans over 20 years. He is also the CCO for Alternativ Licensed Technology Solutions (ALTS), an affiliated SEC-Registered Investment Adviser that serves as a Turnkey Asset Management Platform. Our investment activities are managed by Atomi.
Avala BDC
Target Portfolio
Who We Work With
Middle Market Investments
Our investment objective is to provide our shareholders with current income and, to a lesser extent, capital appreciation, primarily through debt investments and, to a lesser extent, equity investments. Our investment strategy will focus primarily on investments in middle-market companies in the United States. We use the term “middle-market” to generally refer to companies which may exhibit one or more of the following characteristics: number of employees between 10 and 2,000; revenues between $10 million and $300 million; annual earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (“EBITDA”) between $1 million and $50 million; generally, private companies owned by private equity firms or founders; and enterprise value between $10 million and $500 million. We are not necessarily constrained to rigid application of these criteria and may seek investments in companies that may fall outside these parameters.
Qualified and Non-Qualified Assets
While we expect our primary focus to be on investments in middle-market companies in the United States, including senior secured loans, which may include first-lien, second-lien, and unitranche loans, and subordinated loans, with limited investment in warrants and other minority equity securities in appropriate cases. We may invest up to 30% of our portfolio in opportunistic investments of non-eligible portfolio companies (e.g., assets that are not “qualified assets” as defined in the 1940 Act). Specifically, as part of this 30% basket, we may consider investments in debt of companies located outside of the United States and debt and equity of public companies that do not meet the definition of eligible portfolio companies because their market capitalization of publicly traded equity securities exceeds the levels provided for in the 1940 Act.