July 2008

Prospect Partners And Management Recapitalize Leading Provider of Organizational Development and Leadership Training Services

Prospect Partners, LLC and management have announced the formation of Linkage Holdings Corp. to recapitalize Linkage, Inc., a Burlington, Mass.-based global provider of organizational and leadership development and training programs, services and products for executives and senior managers. The transaction represents Prospect Partners' third investment in the education and training sector.


Founded in 1988 by Chief Executive Officer Phil Harkins, Linkage has become a leading provider of human capital development training services, offering a broad line of resources that help organizations and their employees become more efficient, effective and productive in addressing a variety of leadership, human resources and organizational challenges.


"We are very excited about the opportunity to partner with Linkage," says Maneesh Chawla, a Principal at Prospect Partners. "Linkage is a very interesting and well-regarded niche-market leader that has developed a distinctive and superior set of human resources and leadership development training and consulting services. Its management is exceptional. Not only has Phil Harkins emerged as one of the industry's thought leaders, but Linkage is in a great position to expand upon its already impressive base of services, events and customers."


Linkage's offerings include coaching, in-house event and public training, assessment tools, proprietary conferences, executive forums, research publications and e-learning programs on leading-edge topics. Its flagship event, The Global Institute for Leadership Development (GILD), an innovative weeklong high-potential leadership development training program, was named the best of its kind by Leadership Excellence magazine for two consecutive years. The company also offers a portfolio of training courseware and publications, including The Wall Street Journal's best-selling book: Everybody Wins: The Story and Lessons Behind RE/MAX. Linkage serves a diverse customer base of Fortune 1000 businesses, non-profit organizations, government entities, educational institutions and international organizations.


Going forward, Prospect Partners and management will seek to grow Linkage organically as well as through select acquisitions of providers of leadership development and training services on human resources and organizational development topics.


To discuss related opportunities, please contact Prospect Partners Principals Maneesh Chawla or Louis Kenter. 


Prospect Partners is an experienced investor in the education and training sector. Its related investments include current platform company Education Futures Group, LLC, an operator of smaller accredited post-secondary schools in secondary markets in the United States, as well as a previous holding, Education Corporation of America (ECA), an operator of post-secondary schools with training programs in a variety of technical areas that Prospect Partners recapitalized with management and another private equity firm in 2004.