The Anatomy of a Deal - Advanced Drying Systems

Casey Weldon graduated from Florida State University in 1991 with a degree in Political Science. He was a part of one of the greatest runs in college football – FSU was 42 and 7 in his four years there.  He finished second in the Heisman his senior year, and he went on to play 8 seasons in the NFL including 4 with Tampa Bay.  He also played in the original XFL. 

After his football career ended he joined his father’s company Allstate Construction as Director of Marketing and helped to open a Tampa office. 

In 2009, he founded Advanced Drying Systems with 6 employees. After going statewide in Florida, ADS expanded to Louisiana. The company has grown to over 80 employees and is one of the largest and fastest growing water remediation companies in Florida. 

In July 2019, ADS was acquired by investors led by Clearwell Group to advance Casey’s goal of expanding the company’s services and growing into other states.  ADS provides water mitigation and mold remediation services. 

Casey and his wife, Stephanie, share 6 children between them and reside in Odessa, FL. 

Ryan Cortner is a Partner at Clearwell Group. Prior to joining Clearwell Group, Mr. Cortner was a Vice President at Westshore Capital Partners where he was responsible for sourcing and analysis of investment opportunities, managing prospects through closing, and monitoring portfolio companies for owner recapitalizations, family succession recapitalizations, management buyouts, management buy-ins, and industry consolidations. Prior to joining Westshore Capital Partners, Mr. Cortner was a Manager in the New York office of PricewaterhouseCoopers' Transaction Services Group. During his tenure at PwC, Mr. Cortner's work focused on financial due diligence, strategic assessments, and corporate carve-out transactions. While with PwC, he advised on over 75 public and private transactions ranging in size from $5 million to $5 billion. His industry experience includes manufacturing, business-to-business services, technology, media and entertainment, transportation, security, and consumer and industrial products among others. 

Mr. Cortner holds both a Masters of Accounting with a concentration in Systems and a Bachelor of Accounting with Honors from the University of Florida. In addition to his formal education, he is a Certified Public Accountant and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation. Mr. Cortner serves on the Board of Directors at Iron Container, Encoda, Florida Venture Forum, and West Florida Foster Care Services.  He is married and has three children.

Prior to founding Aberdeen Advisory, Emery earned his business and financial expertise as a banker, corporate advisor, and president of several companies. He rapidly rose through the ranks at Bank South, and later Merrill Lynch, before becoming an entrepreneur. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Washington and Lee University.

Almost as passionate as he is about helping people sell their business, Emery is also a strong believer in giving back to the community. He is an active member of Leadership Tampa Bay and serves on the Board of Directors of the St. Anthony’s Hospital Foundation and ACG Tampa Bay.

From the typical transaction to the highly complex deal, Emery has repeatedly been recognized as a leading Mergers and Acquisitions executive in the Florida market and is well known throughout the South for his ability to connect ideal buyers with sellers. His primary industry focus has been on healthcare, manufacturing, distribution, and business services, but he’s always looking for new opportunities.

John is a Shareholder and the practice Co-Chair of the firm’s Corporate & Tax Group. John has a diverse transactional practice, with an emphasis on advising family offices, venture capital funds, companies, angel investors and private equity funds and their portfolio companies on structuring and negotiating complex business transactions, including mergers and acquisitions, growth capital investments, joint ventures, fund formations and recapitalizations.  John advises investors, developers and property managers on real estate joint ventures and regularly serves as outside general counsel to growing, middle market companies. John has substantial experience in structuring and tax planning for transactions.

John acts as counsel to a number of institutional private equity and real estate investment and development clients, including KLH Capital, Mangrove Equity Partners, Clearwell Group, The Ferrante Group, Open Road Holdings, Meridian Development Group, Landeavor, Fairbourne Properties, Third Lake Partners and Third Lake Capital. 

John is a Certified Public Accountant in Florida.  Prior to joining the firm, John worked as an audit associate with Arthur Andersen in its Tampa office and practiced tax law in the Chicago office of the international law firm Mayer Brown.