Built by an operator. Sharpened by sponsor-side experience.
Growth Fuel Advisors is led by a principal with two decades of hands-on operating experience and sponsor-side transactional fluency — through trade, leadership, scaling, exit, and platform build-out. The advisor at the table has held the seat across from yours.
Michael is the Founder and Managing Principal of Growth Fuel Advisors. His career spans more than two decades operating, transacting, and building in the industrial economy — beginning in the trades and progressing through operations, business development, and executive leadership before founding and exiting a platform business in partnership with a private equity sponsor.
As President of MKD Electric, Michael led the business through a successful scale from approximately $10M to $150M+ in revenue under sponsor partnership. He built the operating infrastructure, leadership team, and capital relationships required to support multi-fold expansion in a complex, project-driven environment, and led the company through its strategic exit — completing the full lifecycle of operating value creation and transactional realization.
During that sponsor relationship, Michael also served as a board member and member of the diligence team, leading seven add-on acquisitions in three years while concurrently running the operating platform as President. He has therefore held the principal seat on both sides of the table: as an operator building enterprise value, and as a sponsor evaluating, acquiring, and stewarding it.
Michael is also the Founder and CEO of Leapros, a national staffing and recruiting platform purpose-built for the construction and skilled trades sector, and is co-founder of an AI-native operating platform built for SMB and lower middle market companies across multiple verticals — with initial focus on the sectors where his operating fluency is deepest. His perspective is shaped not by case studies, but by having held the P&L, the bank line, the boardroom, the leadership team, and the deal table in the principal seat.
At Growth Fuel Advisors, that perspective drives every engagement. The firm exists to bring institutional-quality M&A, capital, growth, and sponsor-support advisory to the businesses that have historically been underserved by the bulge-bracket banks and overserved by generic consultants — founder-led companies preparing for transition, PE platforms executing buy-and-build strategies, and the corporate development teams sourcing the next add-on. Strategic clarity, transactional discipline, and operating credibility at the inflection points that matter most.