Executive Summary
A regional meal delivery service company partnered with Realized Solutions, Inc. (RSI) to overcome intense logistical challenges and prepare for a successful acquisition. RSI implemented a comprehensive two-year IT transformation — including custom software development and managed IT services — which streamlined the client’s operations across five cities. As a result, the client’s enterprise value doubled from $18 million to $36 million in just two years, directly facilitating a lucrative acquisition. This 900% return on IT investment exemplifies the business impact of a trusted IT partnership. RSI continued to support the client post-acquisition, ensuring a seamless integration for the new owners. The case highlights how companies seeking aggressive growth can leverage an expert IT partner to boost efficiency, scale operations, and achieve strategic outcomes.
Key Outcomes:
- Doubled Enterprise Value: The client’s valuation grew from $18 million to $36 million in two years, positioning the company for a profitable acquisition.
- 900% ROI: Every dollar of the $2 million IT overhaul returned ninefold in enterprise value increase, underlining the high payoff of strategic IT investments.
- Streamlined Operations: A custom Windows and web solution optimized delivery logistics (coordinating 2,000+ daily orders within 60-minute delivery windows), improving efficiency and reliability even under adverse conditions.
- Successful Acquisition & Integration: The improved performance and scalability made the client an attractive acquisition target. Post-sale, RSI’s ongoing IT support ensured smooth integration with the parent company’s systems over three years.
Client Background & Challenges
The Client: A regional meal delivery service provider operating in five metropolitan areas (Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Dallas). The company offers on-demand meal delivery from local restaurants to consumers, as well as coordinated business lunch services where orders from multiple restaurants are delivered together to corporate clients.
Operational Complexity: The client’s business model involved tremendous logistical coordination. Each order required:
- Scheduling meal preparation with the restaurant at exactly the right time,
- Dispatching a driver for pickup, and
- Delivering the meals to the customer within a 60-minute window from order placement.
This process had to be executed about 2,000 times every day across multiple cities, even during bad weather or traffic disruptions. The added service of group deliveries for corporate lunches (with multiple restaurants and drivers converging on a workplace simultaneously) further increased complexity. It was a daunting operational challenge, demanding precision timing and real-time adaptability.
Initial Limitations: At the start of the engagement, the client’s technology and processes struggled to keep up with demand:
- Legacy systems and manual coordination led to inefficiencies (e.g. delays when weather or traffic conditions changed).
- Limited integration between ordering platforms, restaurant systems, and driver dispatch meant scaling to higher order volumes was difficult.
- Management’s time was absorbed by daily IT and operational firefighting, leaving less focus on strategic growth.
Strategic Goal – Growth & Acquisition: The client’s leadership aimed for exponential growth and had a clear end goal: position the company for acquisition by a larger firm. At that time, the enterprise value was approximately $18 million, and leadership believed with improved efficiency and scale, the company could be far more valuable. However, achieving this required:
- Significant technology upgrades to handle current and future scale,
- Expert IT guidance to align technology with business strategy,
- Improvements in reliability and customer experience to maximize the company’s appeal to potential buyers.
Why Realized Solutions (RSI): RSI was selected as the technology partner due to its proven ability to blend managed IT services with custom software development to drive client success . RSI’s philosophy of working closely with clients to understand their business processes and deliver tailored solutions aligned perfectly with the client’s needs . By engaging RSI, the client sought not just a vendor, but a long-term strategic partner to manage all aspects of IT while the company focused on growth.
RSI’s Solution & Partnership Approach
RSI commenced the engagement by taking on a dual role as IT manager and systems innovator. Under the leadership of John Beyer (RSI’s CEO), who even joined the client’s Board of Advisors, RSI integrated deeply into the client’s strategic planning. This close partnership ensured that technology initiatives would directly support the business’s growth and acquisition objectives.
Key Solution Components: RSI designed and implemented a custom suite of Windows and web-based applications to overhaul the client’s logistics and IT infrastructure:
- Integrated Order Management System: A centralized platform that connected customer orders to restaurant partners in real time. It synchronized ordering schedules with each restaurant’s kitchen, automatically adjusting preparation timing based on driver availability and location.
- Intelligent Dispatch & Routing: A dispatch system that dynamically allocated drivers to orders across the five cities. It used real-time traffic and weather data to optimize routes and adjust assignments on the fly, ensuring drivers met the 60-minute delivery target even under challenging conditions.
- Multi-Restaurant Coordination Module: Special features to handle corporate lunch deliveries, allowing orders from multiple restaurants to be grouped and delivered together. The system coordinated staggered pickup times so that different drivers could arrive at a corporate client’s location at the same promised time with meals from various restaurants.
- Scalable, Cloud-Backed Infrastructure: RSI migrated the client’s applications to a scalable cloud and Windows server environment, ensuring the systems could handle peak order volumes (2000+ per day) and easily scale further as the business grew.
- User-Friendly Dashboards: Custom dashboards and mobile apps for dispatchers, drivers, and restaurant partners provided real-time visibility into order status, delays, and any issues, enabling proactive management of exceptions.
Throughout the implementation, RSI’s managed IT services team also took over daily IT operations:
- They ensured network reliability, device management for driver handhelds, and robust cybersecurity and backup systems, so that the new platform ran securely and without interruption.
- RSI provided 24/7 IT support to the client’s staff and partners, resolving issues promptly and freeing the client’s management from technical troubleshooting.
This holistic approach meant RSI was managing all aspects of IT for the client – from software development to infrastructure, support, and strategic IT advising. By entrusting IT operations to RSI, the client’s leadership could devote their energy to business expansion, marketing, and preparing for investor discussions, confident that the technology backbone would support their plans.
Service Scope and Contributions: The table below summarizes the scope of RSI’s services during this partnership and how each contributed to the client’s success:
| RSI Service | Contribution to Outcome |
| Strategic IT Advisory(John Beyer on Board of Advisors) | Aligned technology roadmap with business objectives. Ensured IT improvements targeted the goal of acquisition and enterprise value growth. Provided executive guidance throughout transformation. |
| Custom Software Development(“Windows and web” logistics solution) | Optimized operations across all markets. Automated and integrated order, dispatch, and delivery processes, enabling the business to handle high volume reliably. Improved efficiency made rapid growth possible. |
| Managed IT Services(Full IT management & support) | Maintained stable, secure IT infrastructure. Supported daily operations (network, devices, cybersecurity) with minimal downtime. Allowed client leadership to focus on core business rather than IT issues. |
| Post-Acquisition Integration(3-year support to acquirer) | Seamlessly merged the client’s systems into the acquiring company’s environment. Preserved service quality during transition. Built confidence with the new owners through continued performance and support. |
RSI’s ability to deliver a turn-key IT transformation – from upfront strategy through development to ongoing management – was instrumental. It ensured the technology solution truly solved the client’s pain points and remained reliable over time, thereby directly enabling the client’s business to scale and achieve its strategic milestone of being acquired.
Results & Business Impact
Over the course of the engagement, the RSI–client partnership produced outstanding business results. Most notably, the client’s enterprise value doubled in a short period, validating the effectiveness of the IT overhaul and strategic focus.
Enterprise Value & ROI: When RSI began the project, the client’s company was valued at roughly $18 million. After the two-year technology overhaul and business process improvements, the company was acquired for $36 million. This represents a 100% increase in enterprise value. Compared to the $2 million invested in RSI’s services and the new systems, the value increase corresponds to a 900% return on investment (ROI). In other words, for every $1 invested in modernizing IT and operations, the owners saw about $9 in increased company value at exit. This phenomenal ROI underscores that strategic IT improvements can translate directly into business valuation gains.
| Metric | Value |
| Initial Enterprise Value (pre-engagement) | $18 million |
| Final Enterprise Value (at acquisition) | $36 million |
| Total Value Increase | $18 million (100% growth) |
| Investment in IT Overhaul (2 years) | $2 million |
| Return on Investment (ROI) | 900% |
Operational Performance: The deployment of RSI’s custom logistics platform greatly improved the client’s day-to-day performance:
- The company could comfortably handle 2,000+ deliveries per day with high reliability, something that was previously fraught with issues. The system intelligently managed timing and resources, so deliveries remained on-schedule even as volume grew.
- Delivery times and customer satisfaction improved. By automating coordination, errors like missed or late orders due to miscommunication were drastically reduced. Restaurants and drivers received clear, real-time instructions, reducing wait times and confusion.
- The platform’s efficiency gains effectively increased the company’s capacity without proportional increases in headcount. The business could expand to new corporate clients and higher order volumes in each city using the same driver workforce more efficiently routed and dispatched.
These operational enhancements not only boosted profitability and customer trust in the service, but also made the company’s success tangible to potential investors or buyers. The consistency and scalability of operations signaled that the business model was sound and ready to grow further under new ownership.
Acquisition & Strategic Outcome: With markedly improved financials and operations, the client attracted acquisition interest and ultimately was acquired for $36 million by a larger industry player. Achieving this outcome within only two years of RSI’s engagement is a testament to how quickly the right technology investments can accelerate a company’s growth trajectory.
The acquisition validated the strategic goal set by the client’s leadership: RSI’s partnership had made the company “acquisition-ready.” Important contributing factors included:
- Stronger Financial Metrics: Enhanced efficiencies lowered operational costs per delivery and supported higher profit margins, making the company more valuable.
- Scalable Systems: The buyer recognized that the IT systems in place could support further expansion into new markets, which increased their willingness to pay a premium.
- Reduced Risk: The presence of a stable IT environment managed by RSI reduced perceived technology risk for the buyer. The continuity plan (RSI staying on to assist integration) further reassured the buyer that the transition would be smooth.
Post-Transaction Integration: RSI’s role did not end at the sale. For three years post-acquisition, RSI continued as a key IT partner for the acquiring company:
- RSI assisted in merging the client’s platforms with the acquirer’s systems, handling data migration, interface integration, and any necessary re-engineering to fit the parent company’s IT architecture.
- During this transition period, RSI ensured that the meal delivery operations did not miss a beat. No major service disruptions were experienced, meaning the end-customers and corporate clients enjoyed the same high level of service throughout ownership change.
- By the end of the integration period, the new parent company’s internal IT team was fully up to speed and the custom systems had been absorbed into their organization. RSI gradually stepped back after a successful knowledge transfer, having fulfilled its commitment to a seamless transition.
The post-sale support cemented RSI’s reputation as an IT partner that stands by its clients for the long haul. It also gave the acquiring company confidence that they could undertake future enhancements on a solid foundation, knowing the system’s creators had thoroughly integrated it into their environment.
Conclusion
Realized Solutions Inc. enabled this meal delivery company to achieve an exceptional growth story — doubling enterprise value and securing a lucrative acquisition in just two years — through its expert IT partnership. By entrusting RSI with end-to-end IT management and innovation, the client overcame formidable operational hurdles and unlocked new levels of efficiency and scalability. The case demonstrates that for companies with bold growth ambitions, a strategic partnership with an experienced IT provider can be a game-changer.
RSI’s unique combination of strategic advisory, managed IT services, and custom software development proved to be the catalyst that transformed the client’s business. The focus remained on business outcomes: every technology decision was aligned with improving performance, increasing value, and achieving the client’s acquisition goal.
Companies seeking exponential growth can draw inspiration from this success. With the right technology partner handling the complexities of IT, business leaders can focus on vision, expansion, and strategy. In this case, that focus — supported by RSI’s expertise — translated into a remarkable return on investment and a triumphant exit.Realized Solutions stands ready to replicate this success for other organizations: delivering robust technological solutions and dedicated partnership to drive growth, efficiency, and strategic impact for its clients.