Strategic Buyer Acquires CL Driving Academy
Transaction Description
A large Title IV vocational college acquired CL Driving Academy, a leading CDL training provider in Charlotte, North Carolina, as part of a national rollup strategy in the CDL training sector.
Transaction Details
Title IV Vocational College
Strategic Buuyer
CL Driving Academy
A premier commercial driver training center
Charlotte, NC
Jackim Woods & Company sourced the target and represented the Buyer in the transaction.
Transaction Overview
Jackim Woods & Co represented the buyer in a national buy-side search program to help our client acquire one or more CDL schools in key states.
This represented the second acquisition this client made in the CDL sector.
Challenges
For regulatory reasons, our client needed to close before the end of 2025 and the combined CDL operations had to have at least $6M in revenue. So time was of essence. The transaction required us to move very quickly, eliminate unnecessary steps, and focus on results.
Solutions
The team as Jackim Woods & Co developed a highly targeted list based on our client’s geographic preferences, size preferences, and other criteria, like distance from the closest major airport.
We identified 693 initial targets, which we narrowed down to just over 300 targets that were a great fit for our client.
We then reached out to the owner of each CDL training company through a combination of email and phone calls as part of a comprehensive buy-side search campaign.
Our initial outreach resulted in 15 schools that were interested in speaking with us. We had introductory phone calls with 12 of schools, arranged six conference calls between our client and the target school, and helped our client make an offer for two schools.
This effort resulted in a closing in 92 days from start to finish.
Summary
The key to this successful buy-side campaign was a combination of the following:
- Our client had a very clear set of acquisition criteria and knew exactly what they wanted to acquire.
- They were well capitalized and able to pay cash for the right opportunity. This eliminating the need to obtain bank financing saved time.
- Our client had a very capable management team, including a full-time CFO who had prior M&A experience, so they were able to conduct their own due diligence.
- The client had an accelerated timeline which demonstrated to potential sellers that they were serious and not window shopping.
- Jackim Woods & Co has extensive experience in the CDL space, so we were able to build immediate credibility with CDL school operators and help our client put together compelling offers that resulted in fast closings.
This entire transaction, from start to finish, took just over 90 days, which is a.
