Don Wiggins is president of Business Valuation, Inc., a Jacksonville, FL-based firm specializing in business valuations and Heritage Capital Group, a firm specializing in mergers and acquisitions of middle market companies. He has been with both companies since 1989.
Don has wide-ranging academic and consulting experience in business valuation, corporate finance, accounting, mergers and acquisitions, and computer-based financial modeling. Before coming to Jacksonville, Don taught at Clemson University in South Carolina for nine years and has also conducted numerous executive development and training programs for business, government, the health care industry, and professional associations.
Don has conducted more than 2,000 valuations of closely held companies and has consulted with many large companies such as Anheuser-Busch, CSX, Union Carbide, Martin Marietta, Whirlpool, Goodyear, and Schlumberger. His consulting assignments have also included several hundred small and medium-sized companies in the U.S., Europe, China, Mexico, Central America, and South America, as well as many financial institutions and local governments.
With a strong track record as an expert witness, Don has been successfully involved in many cases requiring valuation of closely held businesses and limited partnerships, portfolio analysis, and estimation of economic damages. He holds the professional designations of ASA, CPA/ABV, CVA, and CEPA and is a Licensed Real Estate Broker and Registered Securities Principal. Don has testified in state and federal court and in arbitration hearings of the NASD, NYSE, and AAA.
He is a member of the American Society of Appraisers, the Financial Executives Institute, Association for Corporate Growth, the AICPA and the Florida Institute of CPAs. In addition, Don has published in such journals as Valuation, Business Valuation Review, Financial Analysts Journal, Financial Executive, and Management Accounting.
With a commitment to give back to his community, Don has been involved with a number of nonprofit and civic organizations. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Dignity U Wear and Vision is Priceless and is a member of the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce.
Don is Professor Emeritus of Accounting and Finance at the University of North Florida, retiring in 2000. He received his B.B.A. and M.B.A. degrees from Georgia Southern University and a D.B.A. from Louisiana Tech University in 1976.
Business Valuation, Inc. is pleased to announce that Patrick Emmet has joined the firm as Managing Director. His primary focus will be business valuation and operations.
Patrick has spent the last 29 years in finance, sales, operations and leadership roles. Prior to joining Business Valuation, Inc., he was part of the leadership team at Encell Technology, a new technology battery storage company located in Gainesville, Florida. In that role, he headed administration, recruiting, human resources, information technology, and was part of the capital raise team. Patrick began his career with Frito-Lay in the management training program, and later became regional finance manager for the central Gulf area.
Beginning in 1999, Patrick worked for Bax Global for seven years in varying capacities including, regional director of operations, and director of finance for the global supply chain division. In this position, he was responsible for all pricing and real estate transactions for the division.
Before joining Encell, Patrick worked as chief financial officer of an executive staffing firm ASAP Solutions, overseeing all aspects of finance, treasury, information technology, human resources, and was a member of the board of directors. During his tenure, he helped orchestrate the turnaround of the firm in 2007. In April 2010, he restructured the banking relationship increasing credit availability by 10 times, allowing for accelerated growth. Patrick was honored by the Atlanta Business Chronicle as one of three finalists for CFO of the Year for mid-size private companies.
Patrick graduated from Rollins College Crummer School with a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and an MBA in Finance. While at Rollins, he was a four-time All-American in tennis and was the #1 ranked NCAA Div II National Singles Champion in 1987. He is a member of the Rollins College and the Sunshine State Conference Hall of Fame. Patrick currently sits on the audit committee at The Florida Yacht Club and is a member of the Riverside Rotary Club.
Doug Kravet has valued more than 200 privately held entities for various purposes including management planning, federal estate and gift tax reporting, litigation support, mergers and acquisitions, and employee stock ownership plans. Appraisals were performed using the going concern, net asset, and market comparable approaches. Valuations included economic, industry, and company specific analyses and forecasts.
Doug is experienced in the determination of the value of various financial securities including common stock and debt instruments, preferred stock, convertible securities, warrants, and options. Mr. Kravet also has experience in determining the value of intangible assets such as patents, copyrights, customer contracts and lists, and other similar assets.
He has provided financial consulting services to middle market companies including the preparation of SBA loan proposals, information memorandums, and business plans for companies seeking capital.
Doug also has developed detailed monthly and annual financial models and to support strategic planning. These financial models have been used to help clients evaluate opportunities for entering new markets, new product introductions, and evaluating acquisition candidates, among others.
Doug earned a Bachelor of Business Administration and Master of Business Administration degrees from the University of North Florida. He is a FINRA Series 7 General Securities Representative and Series 79 Limited Representative – Investment Banking.
Melissa Ann Lockhart has provided business valuation and complex commercial damages analysis at Business Valuation, Inc. since 2006. Her recent experience includes projects involving class actions, intellectual property valuation, and valuations with and without personal goodwill. Her extensive experience includes assignments with Heritage Capital Group doing analysis for mergers and acquisitions and management planning. She is a CPA Accredited in Business Valuation by the American Institute of CPAs.
Melissa serves on the Board of Directors of Learn to Read Jacksonville and contributes to K-9s for Warriors, the Clay County Humane Society, and the Jacksonville City Rescue Mission.
Melissa earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Duke University and a Master of Accountancy from the University of North Florida, and is a FINRA Series 7 General Securities Representative and FINRA Series 66 Uniform Combined State Law Examination.
Bill Sorenson has performed approximately 100 valuations and related analyses for economic valuation and mergers and acquisitions. His valuation experience includes clients in construction, manufacturing, wholesale equipment, professional service, and distribution. Valuations include application of the going concern, net asset, and market comparable approaches as well as modeling, analysis, and forecasting of economic, industry, and company-specific factors. Bill also is experienced in valuing estate interests for a variety of purposes, including estate planning, 706 filings in the event of death, gifting or other transfer of interests, or otherwise complying with partnership agreements.
Bill also provides value enhancement advisory services to clients. These services include rapid improvement process implementations for clients in a variety of industries ranging from manufacturing to professional services. Focus areas for these implementations include sales and marketing, accounting, and order management for manufacturing. Results of these implementations include a manufacturing client that improved weekly on-time delivery rates from 72.0% to 97.5% and a service client that reduced annual expenses by $320,000.
Prior to coming to Business Valuations, Inc., Bill was the director of management consulting services for an engineering and management services contractor. In that role he served as the contracted lead Lean Six Sigma consultant to the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Panama City, FL (NSWC PC) in support of the Navy’s Task Force Lean initiative. In that capacity he directed the efforts of more than 30 full- and part-time government and contractor Lean Team members. Bill also had oversight responsibility for the strategic implementation of initiatives and facilitated over 75 Value Stream Analyses/Rapid Improvement events. These initiatives resulted in $4 million in net savings to the Navy after two years, with projected total savings equaling $8 million. NSWC PC was awarded the highest marks for achievement during two separate audits conducted by the Navy.
Bill also served as a manager for the middle market consulting division of Deloitte & Touche, LLP, where he led key initiatives during a lean manufacturing implementation at a $110 million drug packaging facility. He oversaw multiple Theory of Constraint-based implementations resulting in an estimated $5 million in additional billings for the subject fiscal year. He also served as the manufacturing lead for an Enterprise Resource Planning system implementation at a $30 million drug manufacturing facility and led the development of all inventory control definitions and standards. In addition to pharmaceutical clients, Bill also worked with a broad range of clients in the automotive and consumer goods industries.
Bill is a member of the Board of Seaside Community Charter School, the only public Waldorf charter school in the southeastern United States. He is also a member of the Rotary Club of Jacksonville and serves on the Board. Bill is a graduate of the Leadership Jacksonville Class of 2015. In 2016, he was appointed to the National Advisory Council for the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO). Bill has served as a judge for the annual Manufacturers Association of Florida's Manufacturers of the Year Award since 2011. He received his B.B.A. from Virginia Tech and his M.B.A., with a concentration in operations and management information systems, from Purdue University.
Rob Sly is an Accredited Senior Appraiser (ASA) and has also received the Accredited in Business Appraisal Review (ABAR) designation. He has over 14 years of full-time experience performing business valuations, which includes experience testifying as an expert witness in the area of business valuation and over two years working in the San Francisco Valuations Group at Deloitte where he performed valuation analyses for large, publicly traded companies. He has also managed business valuation engagements associated with the purchase and sale of a business, mergers and acquisitions, estate and gift taxes, financial reporting, divorce, shareholder disputes, damages, and litigation support, among other purposes. He received an MBA and BA, magna cum laude, from Brigham Young University.
