Our team consists of
industry-leading professionals with deep domain expertise across investment banking, venture capital, technology and management consulting

What we do

Our experienced team works with clients to offer financial and strategic advice.


Offerings include sell-side and buy-side M&A advisory and private capital raising. These services are conducted by Andrew Kass in association with Global Leisure Partners LLC, an SEC/FINRA-licensed broker-dealer.


We also offer strategy consulting and advise on strategic investments, commercial partnerships, joint ventures, operating agreements, financial readiness and stakeholder relations.

Who we are

LEADERSHIP

Andrew Kass

MANAGING DIRECTOR AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER

Andrew brings more than 20 years of technology investment banking experience at Wall Street firms Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse to BlackWatch. Historical clients include Alibaba, Amazon.com, Facebook, Netflix, Google, Snapchat, Spotify, Tencent, Twitter and Uber.


Prior to founding BlackWatch Advisors in 2017, Andrew worked at leading Wall Street investment banks for nearly 20 years, most recently serving as Managing Director of Deutsche Bank’s Technology, Media and Telecommunications investment banking group until the end of 2016. His experience spans corporate finance and M&A advisory assignments across the internet, software and fintech sectors. Past clients include Alibaba, Amazon.com, Facebook, Google, Netflix, SoftBank, Spotify, Tencent and Twitter. Prior to joining Deutsche Bank in 2004, Andrew worked at Credit Suisse, Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette ("DLJ") & Robertson Stephens.


Andrew holds a B.A. in Business Economics from Brown University (1997).


Andrew also serves as Managing Director and Operating Partner of Global Leisure Partners LLC ("GLP"), a licensed broker-dealer registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and a FINRA/SIPC member firm (www.finra.org). Any broker dealer-related activities are performed by Andrew via his affiliation with GLP.

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operating partners

Eli Broverman

OPERATING PARTNER

Eli Broverman is the Co-Founder of Betterment and is an advisor to other technology startups. Eli started Betterment with a vision that technology and automation will help people plan for their financial needs better and reach their goals. As President and COO at Betterment, Eli helped scale the company from inception to growth stage, working across all facets of the business. To aid that growth, the Betterment team has raised $275mm in equity financing


Eli is a frequent guest on CNBC, FOX, and Bloomberg TV, and is a regular speaker at leading industry events.


Eli is a graduate of Brown University and New York University School of Law.

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Stephen Collins

OPERATING PARTNER

Stephen Collins is the founder of d4d2, an advisory and investment firm to early-stage technology companies. He has previously served in a number of leadership positions, including CEO, CFO and CIO, at publicly-traded and private technology companies, such as DoubleClick (NASDAQ:DLCK), Bazaarvoice (NASDAQ:BV), Quantcast and Juris, which was acquired by LexisNexis.


He currently or has previously served as a member of the board of directors of Kenshoo, Bazaarvoice, iCitizen, Mediaspectrum and Spendsetter.

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Robert Goldberg

OPERATING PARTNER

Robert is a seasoned entrepreneur, technology leader and investor with more than 30 years of experience building companies from early-stage startups to publicly traded enterprises. Robert is the Managing Partner at GTG Capital Partners, a Venture Partner at Raptor Ventures, and a private equity investor having had numerous successful investment exits.


He is on the board of Tapingo, Fan Manager, Venture Beat, Sidecar. Most recently, Robert served the first Senior Vice President of Business Operations and Corporate Development at Zynga, and also established and led Zynga`s operations in Asia. During his operating career, Mr. Goldberg helped lead three companies to initial public offerings. Previously, he was Managing Director at Idealab, prior to which, Mr. Goldberg spent more than 20 years in senior management, corporate investment and strategic positions in media, e-commerce, and enterprise software companies.

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Mark Harms

OPERATING PARTNER

Mark Harms is the Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Global Leisure Partners. Mark has been involved in all aspects of GLP since inception in 2004 and has pioneered its strategic direction. This has led to GLP advising on ~$60 billion of transactions to date, deploying significant capital as principal in a number of deals and developing an industry leading Operating Executive Network. Mark divides his time equally between the U.S. and the U.K.


Mark has significant experience in the leisure sector having completed advisory and principal transactions in North and South America, Europe and Australia over the last 20 years. With over 100 completed advisory engagements and with more than half of these in the fitness, gaming, hospitality and leisure industries, Mark brings a deep understanding and knowledge regarding the competitive strategies of the major companies in each industry sector. In addition, Mark has extensive experience with regard to leveraged debt, mezzanine and equity financing techniques in Europe and the U.S. with over US$100bn in completed transactions. Mark has a strong knowledge of financing markets worldwide, significant restructuring expertise and is also highly experienced in cross-border transactions. Mark is also a Non-Executive Board Member of 24Hr Fitness in the US.


Prior to founding GLP, he previously worked at Oppenheimer as a Managing Director and at CIBC as Global Head of the Gaming, Lodging, and Leisure Group as well as the Head of the Consumer Growth Group. Under his leadership Oppenheimer and CIBC developed a global reputation for financing and advisory excellence and leading market shares in each of the key financing product lines. Mr. Harms has a BA (Honors) from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the University of Chicago. He is fluent in German.

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Robert (“Bob”) Jeffe

OPERATING PARTNER

Bob has over 34 years of investment banking experience with Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse and Smith Barney (now Citigroup), in various roles including Managing Director and Head of the Global Energy and Natural Resources Group.


Currently, he serves as Chairman of OAG Analytics and an outside director at Associated Banc-Corp. Formerly was Co-Chairman and Co-Founder of Hawkwood Energy. Prior to that, he served as SVP of Corporate Business Development for GE, and as a member of GE Capital’s Board of Directors.

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Brian Smith

OPERATING PARTNER

Brian is a technology-focused strategic finance advisor and public and private equity investor. He advises venture and private equity backed companies on equity and debt financing, corporate development and ongoing strategic finance.


Previously, he served as head of finance at a Vista Equity and Bessemer Venture Partners backed company, Main Street Hub, and as vice president of finance at Bazaarvoice (NASDAQ:BV) where he oversaw FP&A, investor relations and the company’s financing and M&A activities, including a private equity placement, IPO, public follow-on offering and two acquisitions.


Prior to joining Bazaarvoice, he worked in both New York, as a public equity hedge fund investor with Tiger Management and as an investment banker with Greenhill & Co., and in San Francisco as a private equity investor with Fox Paine & Co.

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Aman Verjee

OPERATING PARTNER

Aman Verjee has over 15 years of financial and operational experience in public and private technology companies. Aman is a founder and general partner at Practical VC, a secondary buyout fund.


Previously, he was the Chief Operating Officer of 500 Startups which was the world's most active VC company during his tenure. Aman has also been the CFO of several late stage technology companies, including CAN Capital, Visto (formerly Collective), and Sonos. Aman also spent 8 years at eBay, Inc., mostly at PayPal, which was acquired by eBay in 2002. During that time, he was the divisional CFO of eBay's North America business, where he oversaw the company generating $2B in revenues and $1B in operating profit, and led finance and strategy for PayPal.


Prior to joining eBay, he was an Associate Consultant with McKinsey & Co. and an analyst in the sales and trading practice of Lehman Brothers. Aman has a degree in economics from Stanford and a law degree from Harvard.

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Team

Tanmay Sahni

VICE PRESIDENT

Prior to joining BlackWatch, Tanmay was an analyst at Nomura with the Acquisition and Leveraged Finance Team covering the EMEA region. He was involved in the execution of leveraged loan and high yield bond financings for several corporate and private equity clients. He has over 4 years of experience in investment banking.


Tanmay holds a master’s degree in economics from the Indian Statistical Institute, Delhi and a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from IIT, Delhi.

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Shravan Subramanian

Senior Analyst

Prior to joining BlackWatch, Shravan was an analyst at Singhi Advisors, a specialist M&A advisory firm based out of Mumbai, India. His focus was on the TMT sectors and was occasionally exposed to the life sciences & manufacturing industries as well.


Shravan holds a master’s degree in finance from the University of Exeter and bachelor's degree in Economics & Finance from the University of London (London School of Economics).

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Vedant Shah

Analyst

Prior to joining BlackWatch, Vedant was an analyst at Singhi Advisors, a specialist M&A advisory firm based out of Mumbai, India. His focus was on the energy, EPC and BFSI verticals.


He is a qualified Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants in India and has cleared Level 2 of the CFA program. He has a bachelor’s degree in commerce from University of Mumbai (Mithibai College).

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BlackWatch Managing Director & CEO Andrew Kass also serves as a Managing Director, Operating Partner and registered representative of Global Leisure Partners LLC ("GLP"), a licensed broker-dealer registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and a FINRA/SIPC member firm. All broker-dealer activities are conducted by Andrew in association with GLP.