Our Team
We take an active role in supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs and work closely with them to help them succeed.
PARTNER
Jonathan Piurko
Managing Partner of the Sage Capital Group of Companies
Member of the Sage Capital Investment Committee
Mr. Piurko’s role as Managing Partner involves strategic planning, investment origination, portfolio management and monitoring, corporate governance, and overall management of the Investment Manager, along with his partner, Glen Silvestri.
He is a member of Sage’s investment committee and also sits on several boards of directors for Sage’s portfolio companies. He is also active in the sourcing, selection and management of Sage’s investments.
Prior to co-founding Sage Capital with Mr. Silvestri, Mr. Piurko held a variety of senior level positions in the legal industry, capital markets and the investment and finance industry. He started his career as a lawyer at Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP in Toronto where his practice focused on M&A. He then moved on to Northwater Capital Management Inc., where he spent 14 years as Managing Director of the firm’s private equity and venture capital investment funds. Mr. Piurko then founded and launched Monarch Bridge Financial Inc., a capital markets advisory business, in 2017 focused on succession planning and advising retiring business owners in respect of their capital raising options and succession plans.
PARTNER
Glen Silvestri
Managing Partner of the Sage Capital Group of Companies
Member of the Sage Capital Investment Committee
Mr. Silvestri’s role as Managing Partner involves strategic planning, investment origination, portfolio management and monitoring, corporate governance, and overall management of the Investment Manager, along with his partner, Jonathan Piurko.
He is a member of the Sage investment committee. Mr. Silvestri also sits on the boards of directors for several of Sage’s portfolio companies and is active in the sourcing, selection and management of Sage’s investments.
Prior to co-founding Sage Capital with Mr. Piurko, Mr. Silvestri held a number of senior positions in capital markets and in the investment and finance industry. He is a CA and started his career at Pricewaterhouse before moving into private equity at Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. Mr. Silvestri was with OTPP for 13 years and was head of TMT as well as Chair of the Investment Committee for private capital investments. He left OTPP and joined Imperial Capital Partners as Head of Business and Consumer Services, where he was involved in a number of small and mid-market PE investments, some involving Search Fund exits.
ADVISOR
Alex Makhotin
Alex has dedicated his entire life to working with entrepreneurs. Most recently he cofounded Growth Equity Capital Partners (“GECP”) with the stated goal of developing world class organizations through Alex’s personal involvement in operations. Prior to GECP, he held several positions in private equity and investment banking where worked with and advised entrepreneur-owned companies on the growth, recapitalization, and sale of their enterprises. He received his MBA with concentrations in Entrepreneurship, Accounting and Finance from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business where he served as teaching assistant for several of the University’s highest rated entrepreneurship and investment courses. Alex received his B.A. with honors from The American University in Washington DC where he double majored in finance and international management with a minor in the French language.
ADVISOR
Jim N. Perry
Jim Perry is a Co-founder and Managing Director of Madison Dearborn Partners, a private equity investing firm based in Chicago. Over his 34 year career in private equity, Jim has either led or overseen more than 100 transactions and served on dozens of corporate boards. Jim currently serves on the Boards of Directors of Asurion Corporation, Centennial Towers, Intermedia.net, Inc., Liquid Web, The Topps Company, Univision Communications, Chicago Public Media and several organizations aimed at spurring small business growth and entrepreneurship across the United States and Canada. Jim is a long time investor and mentor of searchers, search funds and institutional funds focused on the search market. Jim holds a B.A. from The University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
ADVISOR
Mario Nigro
Mario Nigro is a partner in the Mergers & Acquisitions and Private Equity & Venture Capital Groups at Stikeman Elliott LLP. His practice focuses on business law, including acquisitions, dispositions, and reorganizations. Mario has extensive experience working with entrepreneurs and Search Funds in Canada.
ADVISOR
Ed Truant
Ed is the founder of Slingshot Capital Inc., an advisory firm focused on investing in the global legal finance market as well as other non-correlated alternative investment markets. He also serves in an advisory capacity as an Operating Partner with Northleaf Capital’s Private Credit group. Ed is an Advisory Committee member of funds managed by Sage Capital Partners, a private equity firm focused on providing capital to the Search Fund industry.
Ed is a founder of Balmoral Wood Litigation Finance, a fund-of-funds in the commercial litigation finance market. He was Involved in the design, documentation, structuring, capital raising administration and investments of the fund.
Ed was formerly a partner at Imperial Capital Group (a North American mid-market leveraged buy-out GP) and has over 20 years’ experience in mid-market private equity investing and M&A advisory services to private corporations. During his tenure at Imperial, he served both as CFO and interim CEO for portfolio companies of Imperial Capital Group.
He has received a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Toronto and is both a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CA) and Chartered Business Valuator (CBV).
ADVISOR
Mark MacTavish
Mark has over 25 years of experience as an investor and advisor. As an investor, Mark invests personal capital in select lower middle market businesses and certain non-private equity asset classes. As a value-added advisor, Mark sits on several operating company and philanthropic Boards as well as on Investment Committees and Advisory Boards for select private equity investment entities. From 2000 until Mark resigned in 2021 to focus on investment opportunities outside of institutional middle market private equity Mark held various senior leadership positions at ONCAP, the North American middle market private equity platform of Onex Corporation, in both Toronto and New York where he joined as one of the four initial founding hires and helped grow and lead the firm over four successively larger private equity funds. Prior to joining ONCAP Mark held private equity positions at Lehman Brothers in New York and J.H. Whitney & Company in Connecticut. Mark holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Queen’s University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.