Exitwise Productions · 2026-05-27 · 36 min
Dan Bauer spent 20 years building The MBA Exchange into a global firm with 100 consultants across 11 countries, then walked away from the traditional M&A process when the buyers across the table couldn't be trusted with his legacy. The deal he ultimately made wasn't with a strategic acquirer or a PE firm. It was a management buyout with a former client who had become a trusted colleague, someone Dan had known for years before the first dollar ever changed hands. In this episode, Dan shares the full story with Exitwise Managing Partner Todd Sullivan and host Stephanie Horwitz Reuveni: from his roots as a third-generation entrepreneur to a Harvard MBA, senior marketing roles at Citibank and Mastercard, and the 1996 launch of The MBA Exchange from a back bedroom with just a laptop. He explains how he scaled to Inc. 5000 status, why he hired a banker and went through the full process, only to pull back when due diligence turned adversarial and buyers dismissed his brand and people - and how his former client, by then a trusted colleague, walked in one day and asked to buy the whole thing.
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