How to exit a “sleepy” business 10 years in (with zero regrets)

Peter Kelly, OpenLane, Mental Game, Sell Your Business

Today’s guest is someone who, in the 1990s, felt that car auctions could be brought online.

It was a rollercoaster which we’ll get into in this interview. But he sold the company 10 years in for $250M. I want to hear the whole story.

Peter Kelly is the co-founder of OPENLANE (now KAR Global) which is a wholesale automotive auction site.

Peter Kelly

OpenLane

Peter Kelly is the co-founder of OPENLANE (now KAR Global) which is a wholesale automotive auction site.

Andrew: Hey there, freedom fighters. My name is Andrew Warner. I’m the founder of Mixergy where I interview entrepreneurs about how they built their businesses for an audience of real entrepreneurs who are listening in, learning, and then often using what they learned to build their own companies. And joining me is a guy who worked at a construction company, saw that cars were being sold at auction and said, “You know what? I think this could be brought online.” And this was back in 1999 when it felt like sometimes everyone wanted to bring everything online and other times it seemed like it was silly to bring everything online. He was the guy who said, “I’m going for it. I think this makes a lot of sense.” And he built up a company that did just that.

His name is Peter Kelly. The company is Openlane. They did online auctions in North America for automotive dealers to buy and sell wholesale vehicles. They’re still doing it. He...

Continue reading the transcript...