Welcome to Cicada Holdings
Leading with Experience, Investing with Integrity
Cicada is a long-term holding company. We buy founder-owned B2B service businesses across the Southeast that provide compliance-mandated inspection, testing, and maintenance for commercial buildings. The team, the name, and the local reputation stay intact.
What we look for
Acquisition criteria · Revised October 2026
What Cicada is buying
The work is non-discretionary: customers cannot stop buying it without regulatory, safety, or operational consequences. Day-to-day operations stay with the people who know the business.
- EBITDA
- $500K+
- Geography
- Southeast
- Ownership
- Founder- or family-owned
- Revenue quality
- 25% to 45% contracted or recurring
- Leadership
- The owner stays on as the operations lead, or a current team member is identified who can step up into that role.
Examples of services that fit
Building and facility compliance
- Fire and life safety (alarm, sprinkler, suppression, extinguisher)
- Emergency power and generator service
- Elevator inspection and maintenance
- Backflow and water-system testing
- Electrical testing and switchgear maintenance
- Security and access-control systems
- HVAC controls and building automation service
Workplace health, safety, and environmental compliance
- Industrial hygiene and occupational health
- Safety program and OSHA compliance services
- Environmental and indoor-air testing
If it looks close, send it.
We would rather see ten and pass on eight than miss the one that fits. The customers are property owners and managers, facility directors, and the employers and counsel who carry the compliance obligation.
What owners get
Liquidity first. Then upside.
Liquidity first: a sale that de-risks what is usually the owner's largest asset. Then upside: through a seller note or rollover equity, a stake in the larger platform the business becomes part of.
The team, the name, and the local reputation stay intact, and the business gets a real plan for growth: professional sales and account management, software and AI applied to scheduling, quoting, and reporting, and tuck-in acquisitions over time.
One decision-maker on our side and a simple, straightforward diligence process.
Not a fit
Where we pass
- No one to run the day-to-day: the owner will not stay on, and no current team member can step up.
- Project-only revenue, or a single customer above roughly 15% of sales.
- Broad auctions decided on price alone.
- Consumer, retail, or capital-intensive businesses.
About me
Meet Scott Morrow
I'm a go-to-market architect. For 30 years I've built the sales and marketing engines that help good businesses grow, and for the last six I've coached the owners who run them.
I've led three venture- and private equity-backed companies as CEO. Each time, the job was the same as the one I do at Cicada: develop a strategic growth plan, commercialize marketing and sales, open the top relationships that drive distribution, and coach and develop the team.
As an executive coach, I've worked with more than 40 company owners with $5 million to $200 million in revenue, on everything from strategy and cash management to succession and exit planning. I understand that selling a business is personal, and I treat it that way.
At Cicada, I lead growth and capital. Day-to-day operations stay with the owner who stays on, or with a capable team member who steps up.
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