Michael Carter

Michael Carter has over twenty years experience of leadership experience in a wide range of industries and countries. He served as an officer of a leading global financial services software provider and chief advisor to numerous companies in technology, alternative media, transportation, leisure, retail and financial services.

Early in his career, while working at one of the largest marketing and public relations firms in the world, Mr. Carter was recruited by the executive management of a company planning a management buyout. The company’s communications function had been diluted by long stints of corporate ownership by two large holding companies. Carter was asked to repair the communication function and position the company for its leveraged buyout and subsequent initial public offering.

From this early involvement with a company undergoing a critical transition, Carter was involved in a series of projects with a variety of organizations experiencing similar developmental hurdles. Carter worked with the investment community in the United States and Europe representing these companies to their institutional shareholders. He has lead management teams through mergers and acquisitions integrating assets then re-engineering operations to improve their profitability and efficiency.

Carter has traveled extensively working and living abroad for years. He developed a strategic marketing practiced for a leading global software provider that helped guide product investment and sales incentive planning. As one of the key executives and an officer of an operation in Europe, Middle East and Africa, Carter was responsible for product development, product management, product support, marketing for existing products and overseeing sales representatives for all new market development.

His communication skills have been demonstrated in many venues. Carter has written annual reports, developed road shows for investor audiences, given speeches at major conferences around the United States as well as Europe and been an accredited public relations professional. He has been responsible for employee and crisis communications. Having been called upon to assist organizations facing major changes, he has been the spokesperson for the chief executive and the board of directors. He has served as a board member himself in Italy, Germany and the United States.

Carter’s current area of emphasis is in assisting venture capitalist and early development phase companies. He has developed a “zero gravity thinking” methodology that assists private equity investors in their due diligence analysis and provides early development phase companies with strategic growth direction. Zero gravity thinking relies on state of the art data collection techniques and the use of sociological, psychological, political and social analysis.

Carter holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Kentucky and a master’s degree from Emory University. He has been a guest lecturer and an adjunct faculty member at universities in the Midwest and Southeast presenting topics ranging from corporate social responsibility to Eastern philosophy.