Mark Silk

Mark Silk is an Executive Advisor to Blue Sea Capital, where he assists with the evaluation and management of the firm’s aerospace & defense and industrial growth investments. Blue Sea Capital describes its Executive Advisors as supporting the firm’s thematic initiatives and the entrepreneurs with whom it partners.

Silk is also CEO of ThinKom Solutions, a Hawthorne, California-based provider of compact broadband multi-beam antenna products for aeronautical, vehicular, user-terminal, gateway, satellite, and man-portable applications. ThinKom describes itself as designing and manufacturing high-performance phased-array antenna systems for commercial, government, and defense applications.

Before ThinKom, Silk was President and CEO of Tri-Star Electronics and Integrated Aerospace. Blue Sea states that he began his career by founding an aerospace and defense machining business, grew it organically and through four acquisitions into Trig Aerospace, and that Trig Aerospace ultimately became the platform investment for Integrated Aerospace.

Silk earned a B.S., cum laude, from California State Polytechnic University Pomona. His public LinkedIn profile lists his education at California State Polytechnic University-Pomona from 1984 to 1988.

• Blue Sea’s strategy is to partner with founders and leaders of “special, growth-oriented lower middle market companies” in healthcare, industrial growth, and aerospace & defense, bringing strategic and operational support rather than only capital.
• Silk’s Blue Sea mandate is concentrated on aerospace & defense and industrial growth investments, matching his operating background in aerospace machining, electronics, integrated aerospace businesses, and satellite communications hardware.
• Blue Sea’s aerospace & defense target sectors include additive manufacturing, advanced materials and composites, aftermarket support and MRO, complex manufacturing, defense electronics, distribution and logistics, engineered products and assemblies, intelligence and security services, robotics and UAV, space and satellite, technology-enabled manufacturing and services, and testing, certification and compliance.
• Blue Sea’s industrial growth target sectors include advanced materials and composites, contract manufacturing, distribution and logistics, electronics and electrical products, engineered products and systems, flow control and filtration, industrial services, industrial technology and automation, packaging and plastics, security and access management, specialty chemicals and ingredients, and testing, certification and compliance.
• Blue Sea prefers majority investments, but says it will selectively consider minority investments with the right partner.
• Blue Sea describes its value-creation approach as “entrepreneur-led and company-driven,” not top-down or formulaic, with strategic alignment established with management up front.