Houlihan Lokey Advises Centaris
Houlihan Lokey is pleased to announce that Centaris, a leading Michigan-based managed IT services provider and a portfolio company of Peninsula Capital Partners (Peninsula), has been acquired by Longshore Capital Partners (Longshore), a Chicago-based private equity firm. The transaction closed on May 28, 2025. Houlihan Lokey served as the exclusive financial advisor to Centaris.
Headquartered in Sterling Heights, Michigan, Centaris provides comprehensive managed IT services to small and midsized clients across the Midwest. With a strong reputation as a trusted partner, Centaris serves a diversified client base across industries such as manufacturing, business services, construction, healthcare, and finance. The company delivers a productized suite of solutions, including managed IT support, cybersecurity, cloud services, data backup and disaster recovery, network assessments, and professional services.
Centaris has successfully executed a targeted M&A strategy to accelerate growth, integrating multiple acquisitions to expand its capabilities and regional reach.
Longshore is a private equity firm focused on investing in and scaling lower middle-market businesses across the United States. The firm partners with founder- and entrepreneur-led companies to support organic growth and strategic acquisitions. Longshore emphasizes investments in tech-enabled service-based businesses operating in large, fragmented markets, with a commitment to long-term value creation and collaborative management partnerships.
With this acquisition, Longshore will work closely with Centaris’ existing management team to support the company’s growth strategy, which includes further M&A, continued geographic expansion, and enhancement of its core managed IT offerings.
"We are excited to partner with the Centaris management team to help the company scale to become the leading IT MSP focused on the Great Lakes region. The opportunity fits squarely within the Longshore mandate, which is focused on partnering with lower-middle-market tech-enabled services companies to achieve strategic growth objectives organically and through add-on acquisitions,” commented Longshore Partner Nick Christopher.
“Our partnership with Longshore marks an exciting new chapter for Centaris. It brings the resources, expertise, and strategic alignment needed to accelerate our growth and amplify the vision we’ve established. We’re deeply grateful to Peninsula for its partnership over the past four years, helping us lay the foundation for this next phase. With Longshore at our side, we’re refining our growth strategy, expanding capabilities for our clients, and creating even more opportunities for our team. Our leadership and culture remain unchanged—what’s changing is the scale and speed at which we can pursue our mission,” added Patrick Casey, CEO at Centaris.
Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Houlihan Lokey served as the exclusive financial advisor to Centaris.
This transaction reinforces Houlihan Lokey’s M&A leadership in the IT services sector. Houlihan Lokey continues to build on the IT services sector M&A momentum by closing 35 IT services deals in the past 24 months, including the closing of 10 managed IT services deals in the past 12 months.
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