Pete has over thirty years of merger & acquisition and corporate finance experience. He founded Falls Capital in 1993, merged it in 2008 with Merkel & Associates, another Cleveland-based investment banking firm, and spun Falls Capital out in 2017. Falls Capital specializes in M&A transactions representing both sellers and buyers of middle-market companies.
Prior to Falls Capital, Pete was a Senior Vice President at Kemper Securities Inc. (now Wells Fargo Securities) in Cleveland where he handled mergers & acquisitions, public equity offerings, and debt placements.
Before that Pete was with First Chicago (now J.P. Morgan Chase) where he originated and transacted M&A transactions of middle-market companies in the Midwest. He was previously in the International Division based in Hong Kong where he was the business manager for First Chicago's Asia-Pacific region responsible for all administrative activities, strategic and financial planning, human resources, and real estate activities in seven countries. He concurrently served as chief lending officer for CCIC Finance Ltd., a Hong Kong-based joint-venture merchant bank owned by First Chicago, Bank of China, and The Industrial Bank of Japan. CCIC specialized in industrial and real estate joint venture structuring and financing in China. He joined First Chicago as vice president and head of the Cleveland regional office where he was in charge of corporate lending in a three state area.
Pete began his financial career with Irving Trust Company in New York (now Bank of New York Mellon) in computer operations before going into corporate lending in the Midwest region handling the relationships with the automotive industry and its supplier network.
He holds a BS degree from Miami University and an MBA degree from Fordham University. He served as an officer in the U.S. Navy. He serves as a director of Eriez Magnetics, the world's leader in magnetic separation equipment.
Frank is based in Chicago and has 40 years of experience in corporate finance, transaction management, international finance, treasury management, capital markets and merger and acquisition activities. He also is President of Chilton Capital Advisors, a financial advisory firm. From March 2015 to March 2016 he served as Chief Compliance Officer of Transworld Systems, Inc., a private equity funded national debt collection firm, based in the Chicago area. He previously served as Chief Financial Officer of StereoVision Imaging, Inc., an early stage facial recognition technology company based in Altadena, California and X2 Telecom, Inc., a start-up fiber-optic telecommunications company, based in Santa Barbara, California.
Frank spent over 23 years with The First National Bank of Chicago (now JPMorgan Chase) serving in a range of domestic and international positions. During his financial services career, he worked in a number of different commercial and investment banking product areas, including tax-oriented leasing, private placements, project finance, leveraged finance, loan syndications, real estate workouts, international debt restructuring; and in a broad range of industry areas, including oil & gas, metals & mining, agriculture and transportation. During his tenure in Hong Kong he served as Area Head – Energy and traveled widely in China and the Asia Pacific region. He was also based in London where he served as Area Head – Africa. He retired from First Chicago/Bank One in 2002 as Managing Director - Leveraged Finance.
Mr. Grossman has been a member of the Discover Bank Board of Directors since mid-2010. Discover Bank is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Discover Financial Services (NYSE: DFS). He also serves on the Audit Committee and the BSA/AML Committee of Discover Bank. Since 2013 he has represented the Discover Bank Board at the DFS Risk Committee regarding DFAST and CCAR capital planning matters. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Bank of New Castle and its Audit Committee. Frank has also served on the Board of Directors of international joint venture financial institutions in Lagos, Nigeria; Nairobi, Kenya and Cairo, Egypt. He has served on a variety of charitable organizations in the United States.
He received his BS in Electrical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin and his MBA from the University’s McCombs School of Business, with a concentration in Finance and Accounting. He currently holds Series 7, 66 and 79 securities licenses through Marathon Capital, a boutique renewable energy investment banking firm, where he serves in an advisory capacity.