Dear BTF Community,
In this interview, Mackenzie Regent, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Kalos LLP, discusses:
- Resilience and Leadership: Leading the company through the challenges of the pandemic by prioritizing values-first leadership, offering pro bono services to struggling businesses, and helping a client stave off bankruptcy, demonstrating adaptability and perseverance;
- Focus on Middle Market: She saw a gap in services for lower middle-market businesses and founded Kalos LLP to provide specialized expertise and agility that larger firms couldn’t offer, emphasizing the need for trusted advisors to help smaller entrepreneurial businesses;
- Expanding Opportunities: Regent’s participation in the Business Transitions Forum will focus on resilience in entrepreneurship, sharing her personal journey of growing Kalos LLP, and offering valuable insights to entrepreneurs navigating business transitions and growth.
Enjoy,
Mark
Mackenzie Regent, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Kalos LLP in Calgary, is making waves in the entrepreneurial space, offering a fresh perspective on navigating the challenges of the middle market.
With a career that started in financial due diligence at Ernst & Young, Regent transitioned into creating her own firm, addressing the gap in services for lower middle-market businesses. Drawing from her own entrepreneurial experience, Regent’s firm is carving out a niche by offering the agility and expertise needed to support smaller, often overlooked businesses in their M&A transactions.
Kalos LLP’s growth story is one of resilience, perseverance, and adaptability. Amid the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Regent led the firm through uncertain times by offering pro bono services to businesses struggling to survive. One of the firm’s standout moments came when they helped an oilfield service business stave off bankruptcy during the pandemic, securing the financing needed to keep the company afloat.
Regent’s emphasis on values-first leadership and community support has fostered strong relationships with entrepreneurs across Canada, which has been integral to the firm’s success.
At the upcoming Business Transitions Forum (BTF), Regent will share insights on entrepreneurship and growth. A veteran of the Forum, she has participated in numerous panels but this year will be taking the stage as an entrepreneur rather than an advisor.
The Alberta Business Transitions Forum is April 22 in Calgary. Regent will speak on a panel on the topic Built To Sell: Creating A Business That Attracts Buyers.
“I was raised by a single mom here in Calgary, and she was able to take care of me and put food on the table by running her own firm out of the house. She worked with entrepreneurial clients, and I think, inevitably, that led me to want to go off on my own and hang my own shingle,” said Regent.
“The large firms don’t have the agility needed to serve the lower middle market and entrepreneurial deal space. That was part of the gap I noticed. In fairness, when they’re doing multi-billion-dollar transactions for pension funds and large financial sponsors, it just doesn’t make sense for their business model.
“It felt like there was an opportunity to take the best of both worlds: the expertise and acumen of the big accounting firms, but in a boutique setting that has the agility to serve and cater to the mid-market space.
“In my past life, it was often the smaller deals that were harder to get done, but those deals were often the ones that we weren’t doing. The smaller entrepreneurial businesses are great companies, but they’ve never done a deal before. There’s a need for a trusted advisor who can really help them.
I also wasn’t sure if I wanted to be in a big firm for the rest of my life, and I think a lot of other young professionals hit that crossroads. Beyond the underserved middle market, I also wanted to create a space for people who love what they do but not necessarily where they do it, focusing on culture and building a high-performing team.”
One of the key topics she will talk about is resiliency. Founding a business with her husband less than a year before the global pandemic wasn’t exactly part of the plan, but that’s the reality she faced.
“There’s a certain amount to entrepreneurship of just perseverance and that ability to fall forward. You might fail but you learn from it, pick yourself up and drive forward.
“We decided to lead by being values-first. In the wake of COVID, we went pro bono for about six months, offering help to businesses navigating the uncertainty,” she said.
“I remember helping a fourth-generation rancher with his oilfield service business, who was facing foreclosure because of COVID. We helped him get the financing he needed to save his business, and to this day, the company is still alive and well.”
Regent says it really takes a village to get a deal done.
“Even if you do deals every day, there are always areas of expertise that you can’t cover yourself. At the Forum, you can meet leading experts from all areas of the deal, hear real-life stories of what went well, what didn’t go well, and network with people who share valuable insights. It’s an invaluable experience.”
Regent has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions and divestitures having advised on hundreds of deals for over $50 billion in transaction value. She has executed deals throughout North America, Europe and Asia in the energy, healthcare, industrial, retail and technology sectors. In 2021, Mackenzie was recognized as one of the Top 100 Finance Professional in the world by The Top 100 magazine based out of New York city.
Prior to founding Kalos, Mackenzie was a Global Investment Banker at Scotiabank where she advised on numerous M&A mandates, equity raises, and debt transactions. Prior to Scotiabank, Mackenzie was a lead Transactions Advisory Manager at Ernst & Young LLP on their Financial Due Diligence team where her exemplary client service, technical ability and leadership resulted in being selected as the Manager to represent EY Canada at an international leadership conference.
Regent is a corporate Director and Chair of the Audit & Finance committee for a not-for-profit organization as well as a public company. She is a former competitive hockey player, having represented Canada in international competition as the starting goaltender.
Mario Toneguzzi is a veteran of the media industry for more than 40 years and named in 2021 and 2024 a Top Ten Business Journalist in the world and only Canadian. He also made the RETHINK’s global list as a Top Retail Expert 2024 and 2025.