Executive Business Financial Planning

Executive Business Financial Planning

Executive Business Financial Planning serves as the private investment vehicle for William Austin, the long-time owner and CEO of Starkey Laboratories. Austin purchased the small hearing-aid repair shop in 1967 and transformed it into a global manufacturer with facilities in over 20 countries. The family office, based in the Minneapolis area where Starkey maintains its headquarters, was established to steward the wealth generated by that enterprise. While the firm maintains a deliberately low profile, its existence ties directly to one of Minnesota's largest privately held companies. The office pursues an opportunistic strategy across real estate and private equity. Confirmed investments include direct equity stakes in private companies and commercial real estate holdings, particularly in the Upper Midwest and Colorado. Austin has also used the office for philanthropic structuring — he is a signatory of the Giving Pledge, and the Starkey Hearing Foundation, which distributes hearing aids in underserved communities globally, remains a central vehicle for charitable distributions. The office's investment posture does not appear to involve soliciting external capital or operating as a multi-family platform. No team size or deployment total is publicly disclosed. The firm has no known separate brand beyond its Minneapolis footprint. In January 2024, Austin celebrated his 82nd birthday, still active in the day-to-day operations of Starkey and its related entities — a tenure that ranks among the longest for any founder-CEO in the medical device sector (per public record, 2024). No succession plan for the family office or the operating business has been publicly formalized. The family office is structurally inseparable from the Starkey ecosystem — a model where the manufacturing company, the charitable foundation, and the private investment vehicle share a founder-leader without obvious organizational walls. This concentration of decision-making under a single principal creates a governance profile distinct from institutional family offices with formal investment committees or external CIOs. The absence of SEC-registered investment-adviser status reinforces the picture of a devotedly private, single-family vehicle.