Also called: Searcher, Acquisition Entrepreneur
Raises money from investors to find, buy and then personally run one small, healthy company.
You spend two years cold-calling owners of family businesses (a pest-control company, a software firm, an HVAC distributor) asking if they'd sell. Once a deal closes you move in as CEO, learn every employee's name and try to grow a business someone else spent 30 years building.
During the search you earn a modest salary (~$100k-$150k) paid by investors; after buying a company, CEO pay plus an ownership stake can be worth millions if the business grows.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
Master's degree, about 7 years after high school. Usually an MBA from a business school with a search-fund program, plus a few years of work experience.
Ways in: 4-year college, Graduate school. Training cost: $60k – $150k.
Majors to look at: Business Administration (MBA), Finance, Economics.
Growing faster than average. A small but fast-growing niche of 'entrepreneurship through acquisition.'
Low risk for 10 years. AI speeds deal screening and financial models; persuading owners to sell and running a small company day to day stays human.
Classes: AP Microeconomics, Accounting, AP Statistics, Speech and debate.
Official data: O*NET occupation 11-1011.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.