Which M&A Conferences Are Worth It? Pick the Room by Who You Are
The best M&A conferences to attend depend on your seat: searcher, independent sponsor, broker, PE or lender. Dates, organizers and how meetings get booked.
By Brett Kaufman. 8 years using relationships to build sales pipelines, from political fundraising to a 7 figure business to running matchmaking for two communities. Over 1,000 introductions facilitated.
The best M&A conferences to attend are the ones where the people who send you deals are already in the room and the format lets you book them. Pick by your seat, not by the brand.
You are looking at the 2027 calendar with a credit card in one hand. Las Vegas in May. Orlando in May. Fort Lauderdale in January. A school ETA event in the fall. Each one costs a ticket, a flight, two nights and three days of pipeline you are not working.
A broker at DealMAX and a PE associate at an ETA school event both paid full price for the wrong room. Here is the map I would use, by who you are. Every date below comes from the organizer’s own site as of October 27, 2026. Where I could not verify one, I say so.
Middle market PE, bankers and lenders
ACG DealMAX. Organizer: the Association for Corporate Growth. DealMAX 2027 is listed for May 3 to 5, 2027 at ARIA Resort and Casino, Las Vegas. This is the big room. ACG reported that DealMAX 2026 drew over 3,500 attendees, with nearly 900 PE professionals, over 900 investment bankers and more than 1,000 lending and capital markets people.
How meetings happen: the ACG Access platform. You browse the attendee list, book one on one meetings, then sit at open tables in the Lounges. Worth it if your deal flow runs through bankers and lenders. My DealMAX follow up playbook covers the week itself.
AM&AA Winter Conference. Organizer: the Alliance of Merger and Acquisition Advisors. The 2027 Winter Conference is January 28 to 29, 2027 at The Ritz Carlton, Fort Lauderdale. The crowd is investment banks, PE firms, lenders, accountants, lawyers and M&A advisors.
How meetings happen: Deal Connect. PE professionals book 20 minute meetings with intermediaries and bankers across two days, plus opening and closing receptions. Smaller than DealMAX, and the structured meetings are the point. If you are a sponsor who wants intermediaries across the table, this one earns its ticket.
ACG chapter events. ACG chapters run their own regional deal days, and some are built around meetings. ACG San Diego’s CapCon27 is March 10 to 11, 2027 at the Gaylord Pacific Resort in San Diego, expecting more than 300 dealmakers. How meetings happen: DealSource, a curated program of prescheduled one on one meetings between investment banks and PE firms.
I like chapter events for one reason. The room is small enough that you see the same regional bankers and lenders again next quarter, and they remember you. Check your local chapter’s calendar on acg.org.
Business brokers and M&A advisors
IBBA Conference. Organizer: the International Business Brokers Association. The 2027 IBBA Annual Conference is May 21 to 23, 2027 at the Orlando World Center Marriott. Who goes: business brokers first, plus lenders, vendors and a few buyers.
How meetings happen: no booking platform. Networking receptions, workshops and an exhibitor floor called The Marketplace. You plan your own breakfasts. Worth it for co broker relationships and referral splits from brokers in other markets. My IBBA follow up guide covers who to text after.
M&A Source. The M&A Source is a network of lower middle market M&A advisors that grew out of the IBBA, and its spring conference has traditionally included a Deal Market where advisors present deals to buyers. Its next event is the 2026 Fall Conference and Deal Market, November 2 to 4, 2026, at the JW Marriott Houston by The Galleria, per M&A Source’s own announcement. Check masource.org for 2027. Here is how to follow up after the Deal Market.
Searchers and ETA buyers
SMBash. The official site lists SMBash 2027 for April 21 to 22, 2027 at The Rayleigh Underground in Irving, Texas, in the Dallas area. Who goes: searchers, operators, holdco builders, SBA lenders, search investors and micro PE firms. Attendance is capped on purpose.
How meetings happen: no named app. You book your own coffees from the speaker and sponsor lists. Best fit for self funded searchers who need a lender and a peer group. See the SMBash follow up guide.
Booth Kellogg ETA Conference. Hosted by Chicago Booth’s ETA Group, the Polsky Center and Kellogg’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Initiative. The 13th annual conference is Friday, October 30, 2026, at the Hyatt Regency Chicago. Who goes: search fund entrepreneurs, investors, MBA students and faculty.
How meetings happen: an attendee app plus long networking blocks in the ballroom. If you are reading this the week of, here is the Booth Kellogg ETA follow up playbook.
Stanford Search Fund CEO Conference. Organizer: Stanford GSB, where the search fund model started. A roundup by Smash describes it as running every other year in odd years for search fund CEOs and frequent investors, which points to 2027. Stanford has not posted a 2027 date I could find, so check the official GSB events page. If you are a searcher who has not closed yet, this is not your room.
The school circuit. The same Smash roundup lists the HBS ETA Conference in Boston (late fall), the Wharton ETA Summit in Philadelphia (spring), the MIT ETA Summit in Cambridge (late winter) and the SEETA Conference rotating among Duke, UNC, UVA and Georgetown (September). Check each school’s official page for the next date. These rooms skew toward students and first time searchers, with investors who show up to find them early.
Independent sponsors
I could not verify a 2027 date on an official site for any single independent sponsor conference, so check the organizer’s site before you book an event marketed that way.
In practice, independent sponsors split their year. DealMAX or AM&AA for capital partners and intermediaries. The ETA circuit for operator CEOs to back. The deal is in the room where the people who fund you and the people who send you deals overlap.
Three questions I would ask before paying
- Will the people who send you deals be there? Check last year’s sponsor and speaker lists. A sponsor list full of SBA lenders tells you who the room is for.
- Is there a booking platform, or do you build your own schedule? DealMAX, AM&AA and CapCon27 hand you a scheduler. IBBA and SMBash do not. Without one, your meetings are booked from your phone three weeks out.
- Will you see these people again? A chapter event you attend four times a year compounds. A one off in a city you will never revisit is a bet on follow up alone.
That third question is the one I would weigh most. A banker you will see again next quarter is a relationship. A banker you meet once is a business card.
The part the ticket does not buy
Every room above has the same failure mode. You meet 40 people in two days, write notes for six, and by the next event you cannot remember who asked for your buy box.
Capture in 10 seconds: name, one sentence, filed under the event. Then work the 48 hour window, ranked by who to follow up with first. A text that lands two days after reads like this:
Good meeting you at AM&AA. Sending our buy box now. Worth 20 minutes in February on the HVAC deal you mentioned?
Then a second touch inside 30 days, with a new reason. That second touch is where the ticket price comes back.
The system that keeps the room working after you fly home
I built FRONT OF MIND for exactly this stretch. In the room, say a name and a sentence out loud, snap a badge, or take a selfie together, and it is filed under the event.
After, it opens on your 10 minutes for today: who you met at an event X days ago and never followed up, whose firm was in the news, which banker you have not touched since Vegas. Each person comes with a one line reason and a draft of 40 words or less. Nothing sends without your tap.
Start free with your first 25 contacts and see who comes up first.