Susan C. Portin
Ms. Portin is a results-oriented business/legal professional with strong general management, analytical, communications, client service, leadership and negotiation skills honed through diverse global experience as a senior management executive, deal maker and business counselor at large law firms and multinational and entrepreneurial corporations. Her experience spans across key functional areas including business operations, legal, M&A, project management, public relations, human resources, board and investor relations and strategic planning and across many industries. She has led and negotiated M&A projects (mergers, acquisitions, divestitures), joint ventures, strategic alliances, complex commercial transactions (such as licensing and franchising arrangements, distributorship agreements and contract manufacturing agreements), financing and equity investments and post-acquisition planning and integration efforts.
She is currently the Managing Director of Impact Management Solutions (“IMS”), a transaction support firm which helps entrepreneurial companies complete M&A and other complex commercial transactions. IMS, will be providing M&A advisory services on a reduced fee basis to the IR Advisors and its affiliates.
Prior to forming IMS, Ms. Portin was a member of the senior management team of Surgency, Inc. (dba Benchmarking Partners), an e-business consulting and customized software development firm, where she was the Partner responsible for Business and Legal Affairs including corporate development, legal affairs, Board and shareholder relations and a variety of other cross-functional initiatives. Prior to joining Surgency, Ms. Portin was co-founder of Sojourner Holdings, Inc., a management buy-out firm focused on the food and nutrition industries, where she was charged with identifying and evaluating investments, leading transactions and providing management support and legal oversight for portfolio companies. Ms. Portin also served as Senior Vice President of Medical Broadcasting Company, a healthcare communications and marketing consulting firm based in Philadelphia where she had responsibility for legal, strategic planning and certain administrative functions. Between 1991 and 1996, Ms Portin was the lead M&A in-house counsel for Campbell Soup Company, where she also served as general counsel for the company’s largest division, U.S. Soup ($4 billion annual sales) and as Secretary to the Finance Committee of the Board of Directors. Prior to that, Ms. Portin was a corporate lawyer with two large law firms: Pepper, Hamilton and Scheetz in Philadelphia, PA and Powell, Goldstein, Frazer and Murphy in Atlanta, GA.
Ms. Portin has a BA degree from Union College, a Masters degree in Public Relations from Boston University and a law degree from Emory University.