Beyond Wall Street

Kevin Brodwick

The Health Pioneer
Who Saw Tomorrow

Co-founder of Thinkbaby and Thinksport in Park City, Utah. Brodwick sold his company for “north of $50 million” in 2020. He is currently a serial entrepreneur, Brixy & Atomico Ventures.

Kevin Brodwick was walking around his Texas college campus with a little black book filled with invention ideas when his professor delivered sobering advice: "You don't know enough about running a business." That mentor suggested he work for companies at every stage — from Fortune 500 to start-ups — to understand the dynamics they faced.

Years later, while working with a National Institutes of Health-funded laboratory studying toxic chemicals in consumer products, Brodwick discovered something alarming: Dangerous chemicals were seeping from baby bottles into infants' developing systems. "It didn't matter where a product was being made, there were things coming out of that product that were affecting people . . . everything from diabetes to cancer, ADHD and neurological disorders," he recalls.

When major corporations pushed back against changing their formulations, Brodwick saw an opportunity. "The industry was not interested in solving this problem, and that kind of launched me into building a better product for the consumer world," he says. He knew nothing about baby bottles, but he knew plenty about the toxic issue — and, as a new father, he had the personal motivation.

Thinkbaby became the first 100 percent BPA-free baby bottle line on the market, pioneering safer alternatives before most consumers even knew to look for them. But success required massive consumer education. While people knew to avoid things like lead paint, "the world didn't understand what Bisphenol A or BPA was," Brodwick explains. "We had to do a lot of education, both at the retailer level and the consumer level."

The strategy worked: His company went global and drew private equity attention.

When Brodwick sold to New Mountain Capital in 2020, he didn't take the highest bid. "We went with the offer that was going to best propel the company forward," he says. The middle bidder shared his mission-driven philosophy and had the expertise to grow the company while preserving its values.

Brodwick's experience reflects a broader pattern among private business owners who have achieved an exit. According to BNY Wealth research, "94 percent of owners felt confident in their overall decision to sell." Moreover, the idea that founders simply walk away after a sale is largely a myth. In fact, "9 out of 10 entrepreneurs and founders of family-owned businesses remain involved after a sale for some time," notes Eric Boughner, Chairman of BNY Pennsylvania and Regional President at BNY Wealth, who has spent years advising successful entrepreneurs through major liquidity events.

Today, Brodwick is back in entrepreneur mode with Brixy, a plastic-free beauty product company, and Atomico, a wellness beverage brand making science accessible to young people. "I had ridiculously failed at retirement," he laughs, a testament to a spirit that finds fulfillment not in resting on past success, but in relentlessly pursuing new solutions.

Cheryl McKissack Daniel

The Fifth-
Generation Builder
‍Who Rewrote the Blueprint

Chair of the Board, McKissack & McKissack in New York, N.Y. She transitioned from President and C.E.O. to Chair of the Board in 2026. With a revenue of approximately $90 million, McKissack Daniel is actively planning ownership succession over the next five years.

Cheryl McKissack Daniel is more than a civil engineer and fifth-generation builder of some of the nation’s most complex structures. She is the living embodiment of an extraordinary legacy. At the helm of McKissack & McKissack, the nation’s oldest minority- and woman-owned design and construction firm, she stewards a business founded by her grandfather Moses McKissack in 1905. Its history spans from the antebellum South to the heights of American infrastructure today.

Running a legacy family business is fundamentally different from building a start-up from scratch. McKissack Daniel inherited something with immeasurable historical value — and immeasurable weight. "There is a responsibility, a pride that comes with running a family business that has the historical value that my company has," she says. "It took time for me to understand that I had a responsibility to carry this company forward and to increase upon it, because each generation before me left a bigger footprint."

That inheritance also shaped her standards: no cutting corners, no short-term thinking. "Every decision is based on: Is this a good decision for McKissack, and will it open doors for other people like me?"

McKissack Daniel took the helm in 2000, but not for free. Her mother, Leatrice, had kept the company alive after her husband's debilitating stroke at a time when women couldn't secure bank loans without a male co-signer. Once certain her daughter was prepared, Leatrice sold the company to her, ensuring McKissack Daniel had "skin in the game."

Under her leadership, the firm achieved exponential growth. Over the past decade, McKissack & McKissack served as construction manager on more than $50 billion in projects, including major redevelopment work at two of New York’s largest airports. For a firm like McKissack, competing at that scale required more than expertise; it required building an unassailable financial foundation. "Building a strong balance sheet was all about investing profits back into the company, and not taking a short-term gain,” she explains. “It's having a long-term view." 

The significance of that journey, from her family's origins to the heights of American infrastructure, is something McKissack Daniel chronicles in her book, “The Black Family Who Built America.” "Going from the invisible to the influential," she says. "The enslaved to being a business owner of where we are today — that really is significant."

Following a major health challenge in early 2025, McKissack Daniel transitioned from President and C.E.O. to Chair of the Board, relinquishing the daily operations she had commanded for 25 years. This shift has sharpened her focus on the firm’s most complex question: ownership succession. "The management side I could figure out," she says. "But the ownership side is a big question." Her vision is a structure where her daughters retain a 51 percent ownership stake and company leadership holds the remainder, keeping the McKissack name on the deed even as a new generation takes the reins.

She has set a timeline of roughly five years and is critically seeking professional guidance along the way. For McKissack Daniel, such deliberate decision-making is standard practice, grounded in rigorous strategy and in something harder to quantify. "Peace is my umpire," she says. "If I am at peace with my decision, even though I may not have all the answers, I will do it."

Sam Winkler

The Serial Innovator
‍Who Turned Setbacks
Into Strategy

Co-founder of Liquipel based in Newport Beach, California. Generating a revenue of $78 million, Winkler is targeting an exit within three years, once revenues reach $100M.

Sam Winkler's origin story reads like a Silicon Valley fairy tale — if such tales include high school dropouts overcoming dyslexia and ADHD to build life-changing innovations. In ninth grade, Winkler convinced his parents to let him be home-schooled, but his father had a rule: "You're going to be at my office every single day from the time I arrive until I leave, and you're going to watch and learn from me."

Winkler's unconventional education paid off. By 17, he patented and sold his first invention: a biodegradable hotel key that guests could plant to grow flowers. His career-defining breakthrough came while repairing cellphones at a mall kiosk when Winkler discovered that water-based adhesives were damaging them. The solution? A superhydrophobic nano coating that waterproofs cellphones.

"We placed a cellphone underwater in a bucket," Winkler recalls. "It would play a video and work underwater." Liquipel invented the technology that is now standard on smartphones and countless other devices.

The company exploded: two billion views in six months, appearances on network television and $186 million in licensing contracts with some of the world's largest tech firms. "It was the biggest thing you could think of," Winkler says.

But success attracted both investors and problems. At 21, with a significant valuation and $15 million raised, Winkler found himself sidelined by new management who installed the technology in China against his advice.

"Our customers came back to us, and they were like, 'We'll keep going with you, but we want it at 6 cents.' And I knew right away they replicated the technology, because our cost was 6 cents per unit." Tech giants had reverse-engineered his innovation, forcing him nearly into bankruptcy.

Rather than surrender, Winkler pivoted. He created Liquid Glass, a wipe-on screen protection backed by insurance and rebuilt from his garage with one employee.

Today, Liquipel sells to 35,000 locations and is part of Winkler's four-company portfolio including Liberty First Lending; Instaprotek, an A.I.-powered InsurTech platform; and Nano Fit Water. His Liquipel business has generated approximately $78 million in revenue. And Winkler is targeting $100 million in Liquipel revenue for his next exit, armed with hard-won wisdom about maintaining control and choosing strategic partners over purely financial ones.

"Don't just bring in money for money," he advises. "Find strategic investors that can benefit you for your growth. If you lose control, you basically are a puppet, and they can fire you at any time."

For entrepreneurs like Winkler who are actively planning their exit, timing and preparation matter enormously.