Nishant is a Senior Managing Director with over 20 years of business, finance, and turnaround & restructuring experience including positions as interim CEO, CRO, COO, CFO and Lead Restructuring Advisor for public and private corporations. In this role, Nishant also leads the firm’s Restaurant and Food industry practice.
A Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor, Nishant’s finance and restructuring experience covers various industry sectors including financial services, manufacturing, leisure and hospitality, restaurant, food and beverage, consumer products, real estate, home building and manufactured housing.
Nishant has considerable experience in buy-side and sell-side transactions and has successfully represented companies in and out of bankruptcy in addition to managing complex M&A transactions. His understanding of bankruptcy proceedings, debtor/creditor objectives, strategic and distressed sale transactions, merger integrations, and business operations has allowed him to manage all aspects of a transaction, from overseeing daily operations to strategic planning with equity stakeholders and restructuring counsel. Nishant has also advised companies in post-acquisition and post-bankruptcy stages, developing and implementing exit strategies and post-acquisition integration and turnaround plans/programs.
Nishant has extensive restaurant and food industry experience and is currently serving as the President and CEO of Dividend Restaurant Group, parent company to Romano’s Macaroni Grill, Sullivan’s Steakhouse and Eddie Merlot’s. Nishant was responsible for the restructuring and operational turnaround of Romano’s Macaroni Grill and the acquisition, integration and turnaround of Sullivan’s Steakhouse and Eddie Merlot’s.
Nishant also served as Interim CEO, CRO and CFO of Logan’s Roadhouse Inc., a 230 unit casual dining restaurant chain. Nishant guided the Company through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy process and a significant turnaround of operations, resulting in sales and EBITDA growth. Logan’s Roadhouse subsequently merged with Craftworks Holdings, taking overall revenue to over $1bn.
Nishant served as the Financial Advisor to Genghis Grill and was successful in stabilizing the business, improving liquidity and refinancing out the existing lender. Genghis Grill has since made several acquisitions within the grill segment of the industry.
Nishant also served as CEO of Real Mex, the parent company of 120 casual dining restaurants including the El Torito, Acapulco and Chevys Fresh Mex chains. Nishant successfully stabilized the Company’s liquidity position through careful working capital management and improved efficiencies and developed a sustainable business plan that provided management with the strategic and financial direction that led to significant sales and EBITDA growth.
Nishant has served as a Board Member for Native Foods and Sbarro, and currently serves as a Board Member for Dividend Restaurant Group, Checkers and Rally’s and Mach Point.
Nishant has considerable manufacturing and products-based restructuring experience including leading a team in the successful sale of a leading national supplier of component-parts for recreational vehicles to an $850M manufacturing and RV components supplier. He was responsible for financial valuations, developing the offering memorandum, structuring the transaction and negotiating with the buyer.
Nishant served as CRO in the successful restructuring and strategic §363 Sale of Quantum Technologies (now Quantum Fuel Systems Technologies Worldwide Inc.) to Douglas Acquisitions LLC. Nishant also served as a financial restructuring advisor to specialty financer New Stream Capital in the buy-side due-diligence leading to the acquisition of H.L. Lyons Group, a specialty metal fabricator that produces steel refrigerator doors and check stands for the retail grocery industry. He also served as a senior financial analyst for one of the largest roof truss companies in the US – developing detailed profitability analysis, financial assessments, valuations, and product and labor modeling for the company in advance of their sale to Universal Forest Products.
Nishant also has considerable restructuring and financial advisory experience in the leisure and hospitality sector. Nishant has served as interim COO and CFO for a privately-owned developer and operator of luxury vacation ownership properties in the US and Mexico, leading a team that stabilized the company’s operations, prepared the company for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding, and sold substantially all the debtor’s assets. Nishant played an integral role in the divestiture of these assets to one of the largest international resort and vacation ownership companies in the world.
Nishant has served in key roles on numerous real estate and homebuilding related transactions. In these roles, Nishant has led the modeling, valuation, and portfolio performance improvement of real estate assets in transactions that include IndyMac Bank, BTJ, and M-Tec’s sale to Lipper Components. Nishant has also served as an asset manager for various lenders and properties in receivership where he has been responsible for managing daily operations, stabilizing and restoring asset value, improving portfolio profitability and developing disposition strategies.
Previously, Nishant served as a Financial Analyst for a leading supplier to the manufactured housing industry. Nishant was instrumental in financial analysis and valuations, developing a comprehensive financial reporting portfolio, and managing a team in upgrading the company’s systems. Nishant also served as the corporate liaison to the company’s outlying plants and developed various tools to enhance operational efficiency including implementing a plant-level bonus program which improved production efficiency and employee safety.
He is a member of The Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Advisors and is a Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor (CIRA). Nishant is also a member of the Global One Chapter of Young Presidents Organization (YPO). He has been recognized with the M&A Advisor’s “40 under 40” award for professional achievement, and transactions he has led have received Deal of the Year awards from the M&A Advisor and the Global M&A Network.
Nishant graduated from Purdue University with a B.S. in Business Management and a minor in Finance and Management Information Services.
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