News

October 01, 2020

MSouth Closes the Acquisition of iBenefit

Atlanta, GA (October 1, 2020) – MSouth Equity Partners, an Atlanta-based private equity firm, announced its investment in iBenefit Communication, a benefit communication, engagement, and enrollment services company. This marks the first investment sourced by the MSouth Nashville office launched earlier this year.

Based in Charlotte, N.C., iBenefit Communication provides employers with benefit communication, education and engagement services that offers employees personalized benefit counseling with professional, licensed, salaried benefits experts.

The employee benefit landscape continues to change and become more complex. Benefit plan structures, reduced employee medical coverage, high deductible health plans, and increasingly stretched HR departments have been driving lower employee benefit satisfaction and increasing the demand for customized employee benefit counseling. Studies show that employee satisfaction averages about 40 percent under the traditional model, while satisfaction increases to 84 percent in a strong communication environment.

“We are excited to partner with MSouth to help take iBenefit to the next phase of growth,” said Phillip Goodrum, CEO & Founder, of iBenefit. “We feel this partnership affords us the opportunity to maintain our entrepreneurial culture and the basic tenets that drove our success over the past five years while providing the support to enable us to scale our sales, operational, and financial processes to better serve our constituents.”

“With a seasoned leadership team and a strong reputation in a growing market, iBenefit fits nicely into our portfolio,” says David F. “Buddy” Bacon, Jr., Partner for MSouth’s Nashville office. “Through MSouth’s investment in human capital, operational and financial processes, and enhanced sales and marketing capabilities, we believe iBenefit is well positioned to be an industry leader in this highly fragmented market.”

MSouth Equity Partners is a private equity investment firm that provides equity capital and expertise to support management teams in acquisitions and recapitalizations of lower middle market companies typically valued between $25 and $200 million. Based in Atlanta with an office in Nashville, MSouth invests primarily in the South with a consistent focus on management buyouts of business services, specialty distribution, niche manufacturing, healthcare services, and telecommunications/media companies. With more than $2.2 billion under management across four funds, MSouth is a successor to Cravey, Green & Wahlen, Inc., which was founded in 1984.