OUR TEAM
Our mission is to maximize the prosperity and success of closely held businesses and their owners, while enhancing the vibrancy of our community.
Meet the Team
Curtis Rocca
MANAGING PARTNER
Curtis M. Rocca serves as Managing Partner of DCA Partners, responsible for all aspects of the organization, and also functions as a General Partner to the Firm’s affiliated private equity fund, DCA Capital Partners.
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Prior to DCA, Mr. Rocca was Chief Executive Officer of Dental Partners, Inc., a healthcare services roll–up based in Sacramento, CA, but with operations across the U.S. During his stint at Dental Partners, Mr. Rocca led the growth and operations of this multi–state healthcare consolidation from a standing start to over $30 million in revenues in 18 months, before driving negotiations for the Company’s sale in late 2000.
Prior to Dental Partners, Mr. Rocca was President, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the Board of Bio–Dental Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ: BDTC), a global dental technology and products company. Under his leadership, Bio–Dental quickly became one of the nation’s fastest growing public companies, as recognized by Business Week magazine. Mr. Rocca led the Company through several rounds of financings in both the private and public markets, a number of strategic acquisitions (and related integration thereof), and managed all investor relations activities and company operations. Bio–Dental’s share value increased over 50x during Mr. Rocca’s term as CEO. He also served as a Board Member and Audit Committee Financial Expert of Schick Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCHK) of New York, where company share value surged from $2 per share when Mr. Rocca joined the Board, to $40 just 5 years later, when he left the Board following the sale of the Company to Germany-based Sirona.
Prior to Bio–Dental, Mr. Rocca served as Executive Vice President and Board Member of Celebrity Inc. Under his leadership, Celebrity earned the distinction of being named to the Inc. 500 list of America’s fastest growing private companies.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Rocca worked in various management functions with Marriott International, Inc. and Pacific Bell (Pacific Telesis Group), which is now part of AT&T.
His accomplishments and those of the organizations he has led have been broadly recognized with prestigious awards and honors including:
- “America’s 100 Best Small Corporations”
Business Week Magazine - #3 on list of “California’s Top 50 Growth Companies”
California Business Magazine - “Top 100 Growth Companies in California”
LA Times, Los Angeles Newspaper - “Vanguard Award for Innovation in Emerging Technology”
Comstock’s Business Magazine - “Fast Track 500 Top Technology Growth Companies”
Deloitte & Touche, LLP - “Inc. 500 List of Fastest Growing Private Companies”
Inc. Magazine - “Entrepreneur of the Year” Regional Finalist
Ernst & Young, LLP / Inc. Magazine
Throughout his career, Mr. Rocca has served as a Senior Advisor and Board Member to a number of public and private organizations, including service as Chairman of the Compensation Committee as well as an Audit Committee Financial Expert for public companies under Sarbanes–Oxley. Mr. Rocca earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from the University of California, Davis, where he graduated cum laude. He remains an active advisor to high–growth businesses, and community organizations including Comstock’s Magazine, the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, the American Cancer Society, and the American Heart Association. He was also the founding organizer of the Sacramento Capital Cup, a charity golf event that raised nearly $450,000 for over 20 local charities.
Mr. Rocca has often served on task forces and advisory boards focused on attracting capital and creating jobs within underserved communities, including specific initiatives sponsored by the Governor’s Office of Economic Development, The US Department of Agriculture, the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, the Milken Institute, the CA Economic Summit Access to Capital Working Group, and others.
Non-profit involvement & professional affiliations: American Cancer Society, Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, St. John’s Center for Real Change, Capital Region Family Business Center, Comstock’s Magazine, Financial Executives International, River City Bank Executive Forum, Vistage, Sacramento Capital Cup
Curtis M. Rocca, III
Managing Partner, DCA Partners
General Partner, DCA Capital Partners
Steve Mills
Steven R. Mills serves as both a Partner in the Firm’s investment banking business as well as a General Partner of DCA Capital Partners, the Company’s affiliated private equity fund.
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Mr. Mills brings more than 25 years of executive financial management and transactional experience to the Firm. Prior to joining DCA, he served as the Chief Financial Officer of Responsys, Inc., a global provider of on–demand email and life cycle marketing automation software and solutions. Prior to Responsys, he was the Chief Financial Officer of AnyTime Access, Inc., a provider of outsourced lending services. Anytime Access was sold to Digital Insight in 2000 that was later acquired by Intuit. Mr. Mills also served as a member of the Board, designated as a Financial Expert, and was the Audit Committee Chairman for Humboldt Bancorp (NASD: HBEK) for approximately two years prior to its merger with Umpqua Bank in 2004.
Prior to AnyTime Access, Mr. Mills was a Partner with Ernst & Young, LLP in both the San Jose and Sacramento offices, where he specialized in consulting with technology companies and other organizations in various sectors—both public and pre–IPO—concerning all elements of their financial and tax affairs, with a particular emphasis on mergers and acquisitions, SEC reporting, and structuring financing and international transactions. While at E&Y, Mr. Mills was a founding member of the San Jose Office Entrepreneurial Services Group, and also served as the Director of Taxes for the Sacramento office. Mr. Mills started his professional career with Deloitte & Touche, LLP, in various management positions prior to joining E&Y.
Mr. Mills is an Attorney, holding a Juris Doctor of Law from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where he also earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration. Mr. Mills has been admitted to the state bar in Nebraska, and is a Certified Public Accountant (inactive) in both California and Nebraska. He is also a member of the California Society of Certified Public Accountants and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
Mr. Mills has instructed courses at San Jose State University, Golden Gate University, as well as the University of Nebraska. He is a former member of the board and past President of the Crocker Art Museum Association. He currently serves on the board of Valley Vision and is the Treasurer of the Sacramento Chapter of Entrepreneurs Organization.
Non-profit involvement & professional affiliations: Crocker Art Museum, Entrepreneurs’ Organization, Sacramento Entrepreneurship Academy, Verge Center for the Arts, and Valley Vision
Steven R. Mills
Partner
DCA Capital Partners
Craig Mitchell
Craig Mitchell serves as a Partner, focusing on the Firm’s investment banking business and affiliated private equity fund.
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Craig Mitchell serves as a Partner, focusing on the Firm’s investment banking business and affiliated private equity fund. Mr. Mitchell brings to DCA over twenty years of finance, accounting and consulting experience across a broad range of industries, and has worked on over 40 transactions that have ranged in size from $1 million to over $5 billion.
Prior to joining DCA Partners, Mr. Mitchell was a Director at LP Capital Advisors, where he advised large, institutional investors with over $100 billion in private equity commitments. Mr. Mitchell evaluated the risks and merits of private equity funds and co-investments and advised on direct investments in general partnerships and secondary sales of limited partnership interests.
Prior to joining LP Capital Advisors, Mr. Mitchell was a mergers and acquisitions investment banker at Wachovia Securities, where he executed sell-side and buy-side engagements, including the $364 million sale of Logan’s Roadhouse to Bruckmann, Rosser, Sherrill, and Co. and the sale of U.S. Silica to Harvest Partners, et al.
Mr. Mitchell also worked in Debt Capital Markets at Banc of America Securities, where he assisted on the issuance of high yield bonds and other debt instruments, including a $100 million offering for Speedway Motorsports, $800 million offering for Cablevision Systems Corp. and $1.25 billion offering by Freescale Semiconductors.
Mr. Mitchell has also owned and operated his own businesses, including Rainbow Tavern & Lodge and Triple Peak Beverages. Additionally, he has worked with numerous high-growth ventures, including retailers Lids and Noodles & Co. During his tenure with Lids, the company tripled in size from 13 stores to over 40 stores. Lids subsequently sold to Hat World when it had 290 stores. Mr. Mitchell assisted Noodles & Co. (NDLS) during its formative years when it grew from 3 locations to 12 locations. Noodles & Co. is now a public company with over 400 locations. Mr. Mitchell also worked at TargetSmart, a customer relationship management software company, and Epicor, an enterprise resource planning software company. Mr. Mitchell started his career in Sacramento at Ernst & Young, where he became a Certified Public Accountant.
Mr. Mitchell earned his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of California, Berkeley and his Master’s in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Professional affiliation: Berkeley-Haas Alumni Network of Greater Sacramento
Craig Mitchell
Partner
Casey A. Layton
Casey Layton serves as Chief Financial Officer of both DCA Partners and DCA Capital Partners. Mr. Layton joins DCA with fourteen years of financial accounting experience.
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Prior to joining DCA, Mr. Layton was an Associate with Resources Global Professionals, an international professional services firm providing experienced accounting, finance and IT professionals to clients on a project basis. While there, Mr. Layton specialized in Sarbanes-Oxley and tax compliance for multiple companies in the Sacramento area, including a large regional telecommunications company.
Prior to joining Resources Global Professionals, Mr. Layton was the Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer for Sierra Office Systems and Products, Inc., the largest locally owned commercial supplier of office supplies, furniture and printing services in Northern California. Mr. Layton was responsible for all accounting, finance and human resources functions and participated in the acquisition of two smaller Northern California companies.
Prior to joining Sierra Office Systems and Products, Inc., Mr. Layton worked, along with Curt Rocca, as Controller of Dental Partners, Inc., a healthcare services roll-up based in Sacramento but with operations across the U.S. While with Dental Partners, Inc., Mr. Layton coordinated the accounting aspects of nearly forty transactions in a two year period. Once sold in late 2000 to SDS of Nashville TN, Mr. Layton assisted in the transition of operations and played an advisory role for eight months subsequent to the purchase.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Layton was a senior internal auditor and tax accountant for The McClatchy Company, a newspaper and internet publisher with 29 newspapers across the country with an average circulation of 1.4 million daily. Mr. Layton obtained his public accounting experience with Bartig, Basler and Ray, CPAs, a regional public accounting firm specializing in municipal audits and individual and corporate tax return preparation.
Mr. Layton earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from California State University, Fresno and is a Certified Public Accountant.
Professional affiliation: Financial Executives International (FEI)
Casey A. Layton
Chief Financial Officer
Ronald G. Crane
Ronald G. Crane serves as Managing Director of sell-side Mergers & Acquisitions for the firm.
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Prior to Wall Street Ventures, Mr. Crane was President and CEO of Watson General, an environmental construction and remediation company. During his tenure, he guided the Company into the remote environmental monitoring business by means of highly sophisticated statistics analysis and the development of telemetry software. Watson General was sold to a subsidiary of Danaher Corporation (NYSE:DHR) in 2000.
Prior to Watson General, Mr. Crane was General Manager of ProData in Sacramento. ProData provided management and technical IT consulting to public and private sector clients in the western US and merged with a national IT services firm.
Prior to ProData, Mr. Crane was a partner in Sartoris, Inc., a software and service provider of financial management systems to public agencies throughout the United States and Canada. Mr. Crane was responsible for the firm’s activities in the Midwestern and Eastern US and Canada. When acquired by Electronic Data Systems (EDS), the company had the largest and most prestigious installed user base of any software firm in the nation.
As an entrepreneur or corporate executive, Mr. Crane successfully completed eleven M&A transactions, and has since helped dozens of successful business owners realize similar success and liquidity. The experience gained as a buyer or seller in these transactions gives him an owner’s unique perspective and insight: not only relative to the M&A process, but also to the emotional aspects inherent in this type of transaction.
Mr. Crane has been enthusiastically involved in many charities and volunteer organizations, including Make-A-Wish, Big Brothers, Big Sisters, Habitat for Humanity and Shoulder to Shoulder.
Ronald G. Crane
Managing Director and Head of Sell-Side Mergers & Acquisitions
Justin Horner
Justin Horner serves as the Director of Business Development, further enhancing DCA’s involvement with our local and regional community.
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Prior to joining DCA Partners, Mr. Horner was a Vice President in Bridge Bank’s Technology Banking Division in Dallas, TX. In this role, he was responsible for working directly with entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and private equity firms to provide venture debt, acquisition capital, and working capital solutions for emerging technology and life science companies. He evaluated business plans, financial models, capital structures, and contracts to accurately assess risks and opportunities, and served as a valued advisor to his clients. Serving a wide regional footprint, these companies were located across the Central US and West Coast, and ranged from true startups to established companies with over $200 million in revenue.
Prior to joining Bridge Bank’s Technology Division, Mr. Horner founded a consulting firm, which he operated for four years. In this role, Mr. Horner focused on helping execute a variety of analytical and strategic initiatives for both regional and national organizations. His clients included commercial banks, private equity funds, and a medical device manufacturer, among others.
Mr. Horner also worked in the Commercial & Industrial lending divisions of Bridge Bank and Umpqua Bank. In these roles he developed and managed commercial loan portfolios consisting of working capital lines of credit, commercial real estate loans, and equipment financing to middle market clients with revenues ranging from $5 million to $150 million.
Mr. Horner earned his Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and minors in both Business Administration and Economics from the University of Oregon, and his Masters in Business Administration with Honors from Baylor University.
Non-profit involvement & professional affiliations: Capital Region Family Business Center, Make-A-Wish Foundation
Justin Horner
Director
Brenden Wilson
Brenden Wilson serves as Vice President of DCA Capital Partners where he is responsible for leading the evaluation and execution of new investments for the firm’s affiliated private equity fund.
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Mr. Wilson graduated with a B.A. in political science from the University of Southern California.
Brenden Wilson
Vice President
Brent Haapanen
Brent Haapanen serves as Vice President of DCA Partners where he is responsible for origination, evaluation, and execution of the firm’s M&A investment banking business.
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Mr. Haapanen comes to DCA Partners from JPMorgan Chase where he served as an Executive Director. While employed at Chase, Mr. Haapanen was responsible for new business development, credit structuring, product sales, and relationship management, helping Chase greatly expand its presence throughout Northern California and Northern Nevada. Prior to Chase, Mr. Haapanen served as Vice President of Corporate Banking at Deutsche Bank Securities, where he covered large-cap technology companies globally.
Mr. Haapanen earned his B.A. at Pepperdine University and his MBA at UC Berkeley, Haas School of Business.
Non-profit involvement & professional affiliations: Sierra College Foundation, The ARC of Placer County, and Berkeley-Haas Alumni Network of Greater Sacramento
Brent Haapanen
Vice President
Kholt Mulderrig
SENIOR ASSOCIATE
Kholt Mulderrig serves as a Senior Associate at the firm. Mr. Mulderrig joins DCA with over 5 years of analytical and operational experience in the public and private sector.
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Prior to joining Cegment, Inc., Mr. Mulderrig was a Finance Budget Analyst at the California Department of Finance. Working in the Cash Management division, Mr. Mulderrig monitored nearly $4 billion in loans to the California General Fund and was responsible for developing cash flow projections to determine California’s need to issue Revenue Anticipation Notes to financial markets.
Prior to joining the California Department of Finance, Mr. Mulderrig worked in Product Development for the Rezolve Group, Inc., an early-stage technology startup developing web-based financial calculators. While there, Mr. Mulderrig worked with the software development team to expand product offerings and capabilities for the company.
Mr. Mulderrig is a California native. He was raised in the foothills of Northern California and worked throughout high school and college. Mr. Mulderrig graduated Summa Cum Laude from California State University, Sacramento with a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics and completed his Master’s in Business Administration (MBA) at the University of California, Davis with Beta Gamma Sigma honors.
Kholt Mulderrig
Senior Associate
Amanda Schroeder
Amanda Schroeder, Marketing Manager to DCA Partners and DCA Capital Partners, is responsible for spreading the word about the firm’s successes.
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Ms. Schroeder graduated from California State University, Chico with a major in English and a Certificate in Literary Editing & Publishing.
Non-profit involvement: Eureka Schools Foundation (ESF)
Amanda Schroeder
Marketing Manager
Jennifer Stephens
Jennifer Stephens joined DCA Partners in 2009 as Office Manager/Event Coordinator with twenty years of Administrative/Event Planning experience.
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Jennifer L. Stephens
Office Manager/Event Coordinator