Cornice Group is an operator-led holding company targeting lower-middle market industrial sectors. We partner with essential businesses to build enduring value—without the artificial timelines or pretension of traditional private equity.
We founded Cornice Group to solve a specific problem: Good companies are often ruined by bad capital.
Traditional private equity works on a clock. The standard "10-year fund" model forces fund managers to sell businesses just when the value of these businesses starts to compound, often prioritizing near-term financial engineering over long-term strategic growth. We operate differently.
We are a holding company, not a fund. Because we are not forced to sell in 3-5 years, we have the flexibility to hold and grow businesses indefinitely.
We don’t run companies from a spreadsheet in a high-rise. We have founded billion-dollar companies, navigated turnarounds, and worked in the trenches.
We take our work seriously, but we don’t take ourselves too seriously. We believe partnership is built on handshake deals, mutual respect, and straight talk. We leave the "sharp elbows" in New York.
We do not rely on auctions or generalist trends. We identify structural macroeconomic dislocations and current supply chain or servicing constraints. We build across four sectors where our operational expertise creates a competitive moat.
The collision of aging infrastructure, the AI/Data Center boom, and the re-shoring of manufacturing has created a historic "Power Bottleneck" in North America.
The StrategyWe acquire and consolidate the specialized engineering, maintenance, and service firms that serve as the "gatekeepers" to grid expansion.
Geopolitical instability is forcing a massive re-shoring of the A&D supply chain to ensure sovereignty.
The StrategyWe are rolling up the fragmented tier of high-precision component manufacturers, providing the scale and management structure needed to service Prime contractors.
The next wave of value creation isn't in building new AI models, but in applying them to "unsexy" legacy industries.
The StrategyWe acquire profitable, traditional service businesses (Agriculture, Mining, Rail) and embed proprietary technology to revolutionize safety, efficiency, and yield.
The end of the zero-interest-rate era has created a cohort of "Venture Fallen Angels"—fundamentally sound technologies with broken capital structures. These companies often possess differentiated technology and solid product-market fit, but are suffocated by liquidation preferences, leverage or unsustainable burn rates.
The StrategyWe utilize our deep restructuring experience to acquire Fallen Angels, recapitalizing the business to fix the balance sheet and pivoting operations toward sustainable profitability. We aren’t looking for “cheap” assets; we are looking for great companies that need a structural reset to reach their full potential.
Selling your business is the most significant decision of your professional life. You deserve a buyer who sees the people behind the profit.
We buy businesses because we like what they are today. We are not here to gut your team or rebrand your trucks on Day 1.
We believe in broad-based ownership. We often implement Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) so the people who built the business participate in its future growth.
Because we are not a fund, we don’t buy your company just to “flip” it to a larger firm in three to five years. We provide a permanent home where your brand and employees can continue to thrive.
Whether you want to stay on as CEO or retire to the mountains, we design a transition plan that fits your life.
Cornice Group is led by Wes Goldstein and Mark Watt. We are not an arranged marriage of capital allocators; we have worked side-by-side for over a decade, founding companies, navigating crises, and generating returns across the technology and industrial landscape.
Wes is an operator and investor who specializes in bridging the gap between legacy infrastructure and modern technology. Prior to founding Cornice, Wes was a Founder and Managing General Partner of Kilonova Capital.
Previously, he was instrumental in launching Energy Impact Partners (EIP), a $4B+ utility-backed investment platform. As an entrepreneur, Wes founded EnerNet Global, a microgrid development company, and co-founded Above Data with Mark.
Mark brings over 25 years of experience scaling deep-tech and industrial companies globally. Prior to founding Cornice, Mark was a Founder and Managing General Partner of Kilonova Capital.
His operating roots run deep: he served as Co-Founder and CFO of Firefly Aerospace (Nasdaq “FLY”), scaling the company to 500+ employees and raising $250M+. He co-founded Above Data with Wes and has led multiple successful exits, raising over $50B in capital and working on over $250B in M&A.