Dell Family Office Backs $7.7 Billion Baldwin Take-Private

A $32.50 cash offer will pull The Baldwin Group off Nasdaq, but the bigger wager is what its new owners can build with the company away from quarterly scrutiny.

DFO Management, Michael Dell’s family office, and Sequence Holdings agreed to acquire a majority interest in the Tampa-based insurance broker in a transaction valued at approximately $7.7 billion, Baldwin said September 14. The price represents an 88% premium to Baldwin’s June 17 closing price, before reports surfaced that the company was exploring a take-private deal.

The headline value includes about $4.6 billion of equity consideration and roughly $3.1 billion of net debt assumed or refinanced by the buyers. Based on Baldwin’s trailing adjusted EBITDA of approximately $396 million, the deal implies a valuation of about 20 times operating earnings.

That is a substantial price for an insurance distributor, but Baldwin is not being acquired solely for its traditional brokerage operations. The company sells risk management, insurance advisory and technology-enabled underwriting services, and has been expanding through acquisitions while building a broader data and workflow platform. It says it serves more than three million clients in the United States and internationally.

Sequence is bringing engineering resources and its Atlas technology platform to the partnership. The stated objective is to rebuild internal workflows, products and services around newer technology, including artificial intelligence. Baldwin Chief Executive Trevor Baldwin described the arrangement as a way to accelerate investment in talent and technology without the constraints of public-market expectations.

DFO’s role is different. The Dell family office, originally established as MSD Capital in 1998 and restructured under the DFO name at the end of 2022, is supplying what the parties call permanent or long-duration capital. That structure gives Baldwin more room to fund acquisitions and technology projects whose returns may take years to materialize.

Employees will not be fully cashed out. Eligible colleagues can roll over part of their holdings and retain a significant minority stake in the private company, preserving an ownership model that Baldwin has emphasized as it expanded.

The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2027, pending shareholder and regulatory approvals. Once completed, BWIN shares will no longer trade publicly.