Incline Equity Partners

Incline Equity Partners

Incline Equity Partners was established in 2011 when Managing Partner Jack Glover led the spinout of PNC Equity Partners, the legacy private equity arm of PNC Financial Services Group. The transition created an independent firm anchored by a team that had pursued middle-market buyouts for over two decades. Glover and Partners Justin Bertram and Leon Rubinov oversee the firm from its Pittsburgh headquarters, maintaining the same geographic and sector discipline that defined the predecessor vehicle. The firm pursues control equity investments in North American companies with EBITDA between $5 million and $25 million, targeting three verticals: specialized light manufacturing, value-added distribution, and tech-enabled business services. Incline deploys thesis-led origination, mapping sub-sectors — such as HVAC distribution, industrial automation components, and outsourced healthcare logistics — before identifying founder-run businesses with succession gaps or undermanaged operations. Confirmed portfolio companies include NovaSource Power Services, an O&M provider for utility-scale solar assets (acquired from First Solar in 2020), and DSI Distributing, a specialty foodservice equipment platform. Incline prefers buyouts, corporate divestitures, and recapitalizations where it can partner with incumbent management. As a middle-market firm, Incline does not publicly disclose AUM or precise headcount. It operates as a single platform without satellite offices, concentrating sourcing and portfolio operations in Pittsburgh — an unusual posture that emphasizes proximity to the industrial and distribution corridors of the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic. Investment activity underscores a steady deployment cadence: November 2023 saw Incline acquire Specialty Coating & Laminating, a Virginia-based industrial coatings and laminating company, adding to a portfolio historically weighted toward founder-to-institution transitions (per the firm, November 2023). Incline's structural differentiator is its origin story: the firm inherited two decades of deal flow and operational playbooks from a bank-affiliated platform but gained independence just as the post-financial-crisis middle market was professionalizing. This hybrid lineage — disciplined, process-heavy origination from a regulated parent combined with the partner-driven economics of an independent sponsor — shapes its preference for repeatable industrial and service-company theses over episodic, hot-market deal chasing.