The Pacific Northwest is unique in the United States from a transportation logistics and industrial infrastructure perspective. Seattle has been home to one of the largest aerospace manufacturing companies in the world, Boeing, since the global market leader started in “Jet City” over a hundred years ago in 1916. The ports of Seattle, Tacoma, and Portland all rank in the top six on the Pacific Coast in terms of tonnage processed (https://explore.dot.gov/views/Top150PortsbyTotalTonnage/PortRankings?%3Aembed=y&%3AisGuestRedirectFromVizportal=y) serving as major destinations for both domestically produced items going overseas and products sent from abroad for use and sale in America. Possessing common travel that requires crossing mountain passes, major rivers, and lakes, including in metropolitan areas commercial and personal vehicles are needed in quantity for daily life.
All three of these modes of transportation have a large footprint of privately held companies and family businesses in support of them creating a robust opportunity for entrepreneurs to build profitable businesses that are valued by customers, vendors, and create employment opportunities. These spaces will evolve in the next decade through the implementation of automation and utilization of artificial intelligence. They will not be going away as attractive areas for business.
IBA, as the region’s largest and oldest mergers & acquisitions firm with ten offices spread throughout Washington and Oregon, has supported owners of businesses that build, support, and repair things moving by ground, sea, or air in business sales with knowledge, experience, and skill resulting in strong market values in transactions employing best practices facilitated with integrity for over fifty years.
The proper valuation of businesses in these sectors requires familiarity with present market dynamics for transactions, the ability to assess historical financials incorporating issues like future capital expenditure budgets and net working capital, and knowledge related to sector growth opportunities and evolution. A business broker that only looks backwards in assessing value is not representing their client at the highest level. Prior to Thanksgiving 2025, the marketplace valued an ownership share of Boeing at less than $180. Today, the value is approximately 20% higher. Did buyers or sellers benefit in sales made of this stock in November? I suspect, if you were an entrepreneur selling your business you would want a value of $220 not $180 for your single unit ownership share in this example and would be disappointed in hindsight with the transaction less than a couple of months into the future if your broker encouraged you to sell now. IBA is the business brokerage firm who through articulation, education, and persuasion (https://ibainc.com/blog/gregory-kovsky/the-most-important-metric-in-the-selection-of-a-business-broker-to-sell-your-company/) consistently achieves business sales at strong market values in timely transactions facilitated for its clients in confidential environments employing best practices.
IBA is a business brokerage firm that prefers to emphasize what we have done for our clients to document achievement rather than tell stories about what we will do. In the past, IBA has successfully sold over 4400 businesses in Washington and Oregon. Many of the transactions have involved vehicle, marine, and aerospace businesses.
IBA’s automotive space transaction division is presently led by Jeffrey Bryan (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffrey-bryan/). Mr. Bryan, an IBA business broker since 2007, has successfully facilitated more business sales in this sector in Washington & Oregon than anyone else in the region. His successful sales have included multiple service facilities like Dick’s Point S Tire & Auto in Battleground, Washington (https://www.pointstire.com/battleground/), body shops similar to Aurora Auto Center in Seattle, Washington, and specialized repair facilities akin to Trans Medic Transmissions in Gresham, Oregon (https://www.greshamtransmedic.com/). He currently has an auto dealership in escrow pending sale and along with his IBA colleagues has sold a spectrum of ancillary support businesses from auto transport operations to auto glass repair & replacement businesses. Transactions facilitated in this division include both package asset sales including real estate and businesses in leased facilities. Jeffrey Bryan is supported in this division by Bill Southwell (https://www.linkedin.com/in/j-william-southwell-j-d-4689b985/), who recently sold Circle & Square Auto Repair (https://www.circleandsquare.com/) and Amanda Kennedy (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanda-kennedy-370a15171/), who joined IBA as a business sale intermediary after working for the Andretti Petroleum Group (https://matrixcmg.com/matrix_transactions/andretti-petroleum-group/).
Adjacent to the automotive sector in IBA’s spectrum of industry classes (https://ibainc.com/industries-served/) represented for sale is the transportation and logistics space. IBA has successfully represented business owners in the sale of their businesses that facilitate the transportation of cargo by truck, train, ship, or plane for over fifty years. Austin Morgan (https://www.linkedin.com/in/austin-a-morgan/), who has worked in the past driving trucks actively represents transportation businesses under the IBA flag. In December 2025, he sold a company that transports water to forest fire locations and is in the process of selling both a waste hauling & dumpster rental company and a towing business.
One concentric circle out in another industry, education, where IBA excels as a business sale intermediary was the sale of a multiple location driving school (https://udrivesafe.com/) by Kate Date (https://www.linkedin.com/in/kate-dare-08b7abb/) in 2025.
The marine industry has been a transactional focus for IBA’s President & CEO, Gregory Kovsky (https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregory-kovsky-460aab7/) since joining the firm in 1994. A competitive sailor earlier in life and a scuba enthusiast who has gotten wet from the Great Barrier Reef to Red Sea to diving with the manta rays in Hawaii, Mr. Kovsky welcomes the opportunity to support as a resource any entrepreneur who has earned their living serving commercial or pleasure craft in Washington & Oregon. Past transactions successfully facilitated by Gregory Kovsky in this industry sector have included US Electric in the commercial area (https://www.uselectric.com/), Marine Servicenter in the pleasure craft area (https://ibainc.com/blog/nesha-ruther/the-story-of-jeanna-jim-rard-marine-servicenter/), manufacturers of patented products, and service providers like Pirtek (https://www.pirtekusa.com/locations/seattle/#) which replaces hydraulic hoses on Navy & Coast Guard vessels. Erin Ward (https://www.linkedin.com/in/erin-ward-363823a8/), a senior M&A intermediary at IBA, also actively facilitates transactions in the marine sector and has a large Puget Sound marine business with eight figures of annual revenue tracking for completion in Q1 2026. Truong Luu (https://www.linkedin.com/in/truongqluu/), a military veteran, is in the process of bringing to market a company providing manufactured products to the Navy early in 2026.
Aerospace industry transactions require elite business brokerage representation services when navigating government contract assignments is layered on the normal complexity of selling a privately held company, frequently in an equity sale transaction, for seven or eight figures. IBA, which is commonly recognized in the marketplace as a business brokerage firm with investment banking level knowledge, experience, and skill on its M&A intermediary team is frequently a go to provider for seller side representation services by referral partners in the legal and accounting industries seeking to help clients facilitate an exit strategy. An example of IBA’s active participation in the aerospace industry is our membership in the Pacific Northwest Aerospace Alliance (https://www.pnaa.net/). Seth Rudin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethrudin/), who facilitated the sale of TruFab (https://trufabllc.com/) with its contracts with Boeing in Q4 2025 is IBA’s lead M&A intermediary for this sector.
The sale of a business facilitated by IBA traditionally takes three to nine months. A transition period where departing ownership provides consulting support to their successor traditionally follows. Parties wishing to retire in 2026 should begin to think about getting their vehicles “in gear” and moving down the road in Q1. All conversations with IBA are held in strict confidence. IBA offers complimentary professional opinions of the market value of privately held companies, family businesses, and commercial real estate to potential clients and only seeks payment for our services upon project completion.
IBA, the Pacific Northwest’s premier business brokerage firm since 1975, is available as an information resource to the media, business brokerage, mergers & acquisitions, and real estate communities on subjects relevant to the purchase & sale of privately held companies and family businesses. IBA is recognized as one of the best business brokerage firms in the nation based on its long track record of successfully negotiating “win-win” business sale transactions in environments of full disclosure employing “best practices”.