Aleks Quenneville

Aleks Quenneville — who now goes by her married name, Aleks Spellman — is a Vice President on the investment team at Summer Street Capital Partners, a Buffalo, NY-based private equity firm founded in 1999. She joined Summer Street from Dwellworks, a former Summer Street portfolio company, where she served as Director of Financial Planning & Analysis (having earlier worked there as a Financial Analyst). At the time the underlying stub data was captured she held the title of Senior Associate; she has since been promoted to Vice President.

She earned a B.S. in Economics from John Carroll University and a Master's degree in Economics from Cleveland State University, and she is a CFA Charterholder. Her academic and operating background in economics and corporate FP&A underpins the finance-and-analysis-heavy role she plays at the firm.

At Summer Street, Aleks assists across the investment process — due diligence and transaction execution — and supports valuation, financial reporting, and ongoing financial analysis for portfolio companies. She has been closely involved with portfolio companies including Dwellworks, Action Environmental, Apple Valley Waste, and Halco Lighting Technologies, and she authors much of the firm's transaction and portfolio communications.

• Summer Street is a control-oriented lower-middle-market private equity investor, not an angel or seed-stage venture investor — it partners with management teams via buyouts, growth capital, family transitions, corporate divestitures, and recapitalizations.
• Targets profitable companies, typically in the ~$20M–$150M revenue range, "across the US & Canada."
• Core sector experience spans manufacturing, distribution, business & industrial services, and environmental / waste services (waste & recycling has been a particularly active vertical).
• The firm's stated posture is investing "alongside talented managers, bringing capital and other resources" to support acquisitions and aggressive growth strategies.
• Aleks's own perspective on the work: working with ambitious business owners to accelerate growth "through new product lines or territory expansion" is what makes the effort rewarding.