Pantek Partners forges deep, enduring relationships with our clients, working alongside them before engagement, throughout the transaction, and well beyond closing. These case studies demonstrate how our collaborative approach helps optimize successful outcomes for our clients’ businesses.

Setex Technologies

1. Company Overview

Company: Setex Technologies (setextechnologies.com)
Industry: Advanced Materials / Adhesives & Consumer Grip Technology
Engagement Mandate: Series B & subsequent M&A

Series B → Asset Sale → in ~12 Months

This case study illustrates Pantek Partners’ ability to integrate capital formation and strategic M&A execution over a multi-year period. Pantek initially advised Setex on a targeted Series B financing in 2022 with a global strategic partner, then re-engaged to run a competitive M&A process in 2023/2024. The engagement culminated in the acquisition of Setex’s B2B industrial adhesives business by Shin-Etsu, delivering liquidity for shareholders and enabling the company to sharpen its strategic focus on its consumer business.

Setex is an advanced materials company developing proprietary, gecko-inspired dry adhesive materials with applications across both industrial and consumer markets. The company built a high-value B2B industrial adhesives business serving manufacturers with performance-critical gripping and bonding solutions, alongside a growing B2C consumer products business offering anti-slip grip accessories for everyday use. Together, these businesses demonstrated the scalability and versatility of Setex’s patented materials platform.

2. Series B Situation

As Setex approached a Series B, the company faced strategic complexity. While its B2B industrial adhesives business represented a highly attractive asset for global materials companies, the simultaneous growth of its B2C consumer business created challenges in positioning, valuation, and long-term focus.

Setex needed a Series B partner who could provide strategic validation while preserving flexibility between continued growth and a potential strategic transaction.

3. Pantek Partners’ Series B Approach

Pantek worked closely with Setex to evaluate financing and strategic pathways in parallel:

  • Clarified the strategic value of the B2B industrial adhesives business.
  • Positioned the B2C consumer business as proof of platform adoption and versatility.
  • Designed a targeted Series B process explicitly structured to enable a strategic outcome, not just capital.
  • Rather than pursuing a broad financial raise, Pantek focused on a small group of global materials leaders with clear strategic and acquisition alignment. The Series B was positioned as a partnership that could evolve over time.

4. Series B Process Results

Series B financing from a syndicate which included a Japanese global strategic partner, providing both growth capital for the B2C business and strong third-party validation of Setex’s industrial adhesives platform.

Setex M&A Situation

Approximately one year after the Series B financing, Setex re-engaged Pantek Partners to evaluate next-stage strategic alternatives.

Given the strength of the strategic relationship established during the Series B and increasing inbound strategic interest, Setex elected to formally evaluate M&A outcomes alongside continued standalone growth.

Pantek Partners’ M&A Approach

Pantek conducted a structured evaluation of strategic alternatives, leveraging deep familiarity with Setex, its shareholders, and the global industrial adhesives landscape.

  • Executed targeted outreach to the largest adhesive and specialty materials companies globally, focusing on buyers with clear strategic fit and integration capability.
  • Managed a competitive process that generated multiple acquisition offers, maximizing optionality and negotiating leverage for shareholders.
  • Advised on transaction structure, valuation, and separation considerations to optimize outcomes and preserve strategic clarity.
  • The process culminated in the acquisition of Setex’s B2B industrial adhesives business by Shin-Etsu, providing liquidity for shareholders and capital that enabled Setex to focus and accelerate growth of its B2C consumer business.

M&A Process Results

  • Strategic asset sale completed ~24 months post-financing which provided financing for the go-forward.
  • Transaction provided capital and strategic clarity, enabling Setex to focus fully on scaling its B2C consumer business.
“Pantek played an essential role in guiding Setex through a period of significant strategic complexity. Their team not only understood the nuances of our dual business model, but helped us articulate the strategic value of each business line with exceptional clarity to both domestic and international investor and buyer audiences.  Throughout both the Series B and the subsequent M&A process, Pantek combined top-tier strategic judgment with expert execution—designing highly targeted investor and buyer outreach, orchestrating real competitive tension among strategic buyers, and managing every step of the process with precision. The result was a transaction that maximized value for our shareholders and positioned Setex to re-capitalize and accelerate our go-forward consumer business. We couldn’t have asked for a better partner.” — Nick Kuhn, CEO, Setex Technologies

Terrraline

1. Company Overview

Company: Terraline (https://terraline.io)
Industry: Mobility and Transportation
Stage: Series A
Summary: Terraline’s Software Defined Vehicle platform powers the next generation of intelligent machines.  Terraline Stream™ unifies vehicle control and telemetry, enabling Over-The-Air (OTA) updates, digital dashboards and autonomy-ready APIs.

2. Situation / Challenge

Terraline was founded by entrepreneur Graham Doorley, former head of Waymo’s heavy truck program and a senior leader at Tesla. He launched Terraline to develop a ground-up Class 8 EV truck with advanced sensors, controls, and a powertrain capable of 500 miles of range. The team included leaders from Tesla, Waymo, Rivian, Ford, and Nikola.

After completing a seed round, Terraline encountered challenges raising its Series A, driven by the significant capital requirements associated with heavy-truck manufacturing and investor hesitancy around factory build-out risk. The Company had previously engaged another investment banker who pursued a broad, unfocused outreach strategy and conveyed inconsistent messaging, which ultimately complicated subsequent fundraising efforts following the termination of that engagement.

Key Challenges:

  • Building a proprietary factory and vehicle platform required over $300M to reach production and break-even.
  • Institutional investors were hesitant due to the capital intensity.
  • Limited appetite for funding a new truck OEM
  • A previously hired investment banker used a generic outreach process that misrepresented the company and polluted the investor pipeline.
  • The company had previously hired an investment banker that misunderstood the product and key messages, sent a boiler-plate email blast to hundreds of investors in a shotgun approach, which potentially polluted the potential investor base.

3. Pantek Partners’ Strategic Approach

Pre‑Engagement Guidance

We started helping the company even prior to engagement by advising the Company to transition to a fabless business model which materially reducing capital requirements. We also guided management in repositioning its data and analytics capabilities into a recurring-revenue offering. In parallel, we worked closely with the Company to secure key proof points—including customer MOUs and proof-of-concept programs—to strengthen its market positioning and readiness for institutional fundraising, culminating in a comprehensive assessment of market position and Series A preparedness.

  • Strategic recommendations for product, GTM, or financial clarity
  • Identification of gaps in metrics, forecasting, or investor narrative

Engagement Execution

  • Pantek guided the company to create a new financial model reflecting the fabless business model, recurring revenue and bottoms up forecasts. The result was a business model that required over 5X lower capital to get to break-even.
  • Created a preliminary data room with materials relevant to potential investors (product, technical, customer and forecasts), and removed outdated files and put legal and corporate documents into a separate confirmatory data room, for post-term sheet due diligence
  • Supported investor due diligence

Post‑Engagement Support

  • Guided a strategic pivot toward a Software Defined Vehicle platform leveraging Terraline’s core IP.
  • Advising the company on positioning for the next funding raise

4. Results

  • Secured term sheets at strong valuation and held first closing of Series A.
  • Strengthened the financial and strategic narrative.
  • Strategic repositioning that unlocked new traction with both customers and new investors
  • Enhanced long‑term growth trajectory
“We had hired other bankers before, but they took a very transactional approach that did not tell our story appropriately and ultimately were not successful. Brian and the Pantek team worked closely with us to understand our core value propositions, align our product offering, business model and financial forecasts to enable us to successfully close our Series A financing and set us up for growth and our next fund raise.” — Graham Doorley, Founder & CEO, Terraline
terraline ceo