When you think of the greatest private equity deals of all time, names like Google, Facebook, Uber, Dell, and Hilton come to mind. After a recent episode of Private Equity Deals, you might also think about 3G’s acquisition of Burger King. But I’d bet you wouldn’t think about an oil and gas play called CrownRock. Lime Rock Capital created CrownRock alongside a management team with $96.5 million of cash and assets in 2007. Seventeen years later, sold the business to Occidental Petroleum for $12.5 billion. Lime Rock’s original investment made 79x its money, a net IRR of 18%, and $7.5 billion in gains, which ranks in the top ten fully exited private equity deals of all time. It also exited a continuation vehicle that generated 3x its cost over the last six years of the deal’s life. My guests to discuss the firm and its grand slam CrownRock deal are Lime Rock Managing Directors John Reynolds, Jonathan Farber, and J McLane. Our conversation covers Lime Rock’s investment approach and the example of CrownRock. We dive into the initial investment thesis around vertical drilling, the three extinction threats to the business, innovation of horizontal drilling, management excellence, exit options along the way, and the ‘forever hold’ mindset that allowed CrownRock to compound extraordinary amounts of capital. Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey Learn More Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn Subscribe to the mailing list Access Transcript with Premium Membership

Donald Miller is the CEO of StoryBrand and author of ten books that have collectively spent more than a year on New York Times Bestseller lists. Don helps businesses clarify their message so customers will listen. His latest book, Building a Storybrand 2.0, is a revised edition of one of the most succinct, impactful, and actionable books I’ve come across on storytelling. Our conversation covers Don’s most important lessons in telling a story that resonates with customers, including the seven elements of story structure and key components of each. Don wants to share his gift for taglines with you. He recently launched storybrand.ai, a free LLM trained on 120 pages of his insights. In just seven minutes, you can have Don write your tagline. Take Capital Allocators Audience Engagement Survey Learn More Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn Subscribe to the mailing list Access Transcript with Premium Membership