Sunny Vanderbeck
Sunny Vanderbeck is an investor, entrepreneur, best-selling author, and former military leader focused on accelerating the growth of mid-market companies and creating best-in-class, built-to-last businesses.
Sunny is co-founder of Satori Capital, a multi-strategy investment firm founded on the principles of conscious capitalism. By providing real-world insights from its experienced team and long-term funding with no fixed time constraints, Satori acts as a true partner for its portfolio companies as it challenges them to pursue extraordinary outcomes for all stakeholder groups.
Before founding Satori, Sunny co-founded and served as CEO of Data Return, a leading provider of managed services and utility computing. The company sustained 40% quarter-over-quarter growth for more than three years and reached a $3 billion market capitalization, making Sunny one of the youngest CEOs ever to lead a Nasdaq-listed company. For more than a decade, Sunny led the company through all phases of growth and transformation, received numerous honors including an “Entrepreneur of the Year” finalist designation from Ernst and Young, and nurtured a conscious culture for all of the business’ stakeholders.
His experiences with building, selling, buying back, and re-selling Data Return, along with his subsequent involvement with dozens of private businesses at Satori, led Sunny to publish his first book, Selling Without Selling Out: How to Sell Your Business Without Selling Your Soul. The book serves as a roadmap for business leaders who face the unique challenges and quandaries involved in selling a business or taking on a financial partner. Drawing on hard-won wisdom earned through decades of experience, Sunny and other business founders and CEOs provide pragmatic guidance on navigating the complicated ins and outs of the sale process while preserving what matters most.
Prior to founding Data Return, Sunny served as a Section Leader of the 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment and led technical teams at Microsoft. Both roles helped him learn the value of principled leadership in extraordinarily challenging situations. Sunny continues to share his thoughts on leadership, strategy, business operations, and long-term value creation as a sought-after speaker and as an advisor and board member to several private companies. He is also a long-standing member of YPO (formerly Young Presidents’ Organization), where he served as the North American co-chair of the organization’s sustainable business network and co-founded the YPO Entrepreneurship and Innovation Network, which helps more than 3,500 president and CEO members accelerate the growth of their businesses.