Stephen Stites

Stephen Stites is a Principal on the investment team at Summit Park, a Charlotte, North Carolina-based private equity firm founded in 2006 that focuses exclusively on the lower middle market. He joined Summit Park in August 2016 as an Associate, was promoted to Senior Associate in 2019, later served as Vice President, and was elevated to Principal in January 2025.

Before joining Summit Park, Stites spent two years (August 2014 to July 2016) as an Investment Banking Analyst in the Aerospace, Defense and Government Services Group at Harris Williams & Co., a leading middle-market M&A advisory firm. Earlier, he worked as a Strategy and Business Planning Analyst at Health Diagnostic Laboratory (June 2013 to August 2014).

Stites earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with Special Attainments in Commerce (minor in Philosophy) from Washington and Lee University, graduating in 2013.

At Summit Park, he takes an active, board-level role with portfolio companies. Early in his tenure he worked most closely with Exacta, Fast Growing Trees, Arkive, and Control Company; within the firm's current active portfolio he works closely with Elliott Aviation, StableDry, and Thrust Flight, and he played an integral role in Summit Park's realization (exit) of United Air Temp.

• Invests as a control-oriented private equity partner in lower-middle-market businesses — not seed or angel deals (the "Angel Investors / Seed Round" label from data aggregators is inaccurate).
• Targets companies with roughly $20–100M in revenue or $4–15M in EBITDA in services, consumer, and industrial growth sectors.
• Summit Park positions itself as an operational partner that helps founders "scale their businesses by providing the resources and collaboration to execute on a shared vision," leaning on an in-house Value Creation Team, dedicated sourcing, and its "LEAD Program."
• Prefers deals in the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic, structured as recapitalizations, management buyouts, family successions, corporate divestitures, or industry consolidations.
• Stites's personal deal experience skews toward aviation services and residential/field services businesses (Elliott Aviation, Thrust Flight, StableDry, United Air Temp).