According to a recent LinkedIn post from Baton, the company is focusing on a long-standing information gap faced by small business owners preparing for retirement. The post highlights that traditional certified appraisals can cost between $3,000 and $8,000 and take weeks, making them impractical for many owners of smaller firms.
Claim 55% Off TipRanks
- Unlock hedge fund-level data and powerful investing tools for smarter, sharper decisions
- Discover top-performing stock ideas and upgrade to a portfolio of market leaders with Smart Investor Picks
The post suggests that as a result, many owners make decisions on hiring, reinvestment, and sale timing without clear insight into their businesses’ market value. It also notes that prospective buyers often possess better valuation data, framing this imbalance as a structural design flaw rather than a neutral market outcome.
As shared in the post, Baton is positioning its offering as a way to provide “knowing your number” at no cost, with further details referenced in an external piece. For investors, this focus on free or low-cost valuation tools aimed at the estimated 3 million small business owners expected to retire in the next decade could indicate a strategy to build scale and data assets in the small business transaction market.
If Baton can capture a meaningful share of these prospective sellers by lowering friction around valuation, it may strengthen its role in succession planning, M&A facilitation, or related financial services. Over time, this could enhance the company’s ability to monetize adjacent services, deepen its data moat, and improve its competitive positioning within the small business exit and advisory ecosystem.