The Stepping Stones Group, a national provider of therapeutic, behavioral, autism, nursing and educational services for children in school, home and community settings, acquired the Center for Behavioral, Educational, and Social Therapies (CBEST) in the Los Angeles area. Hexagon Capital Alliance, a middle-market investment banking firm providing mergers & acquisitions, capital raise and strategic advisory services, represented CBEST in the transaction.
Established in 2002, CBEST provides behavior therapy for students who have neurodevelopmental and/or emotional disorders such as autism spectrum disorder, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, speech/language issues and specific learning disorders.
The Stepping Stones Group, a portfolio company of Five Arrows Capital Partners, provides therapy and behavioral health services for children in the K-12 educational setting. The Stepping Stones Group serves more than 1,000 clients and 300,000 children annually across 42 states.
The CBEST acquisition marks The Stepping Stones Group’s 3rd acquisition of 2022. In January, the company acquired The Southcoast Autism Center, a Massachusetts-based behavioral health company that provides center-based applied behavior analysis therapy for children with autism spectrum disorder in the community and home setting. In May, The Stepping Stones Group acquired HM Therapy, a therapeutic and behavioral company founded in 2007 that is based in Carlsbad, California.
According to the LevinPro HC database, this marks the 62nd Behavioral Health Care (BHC) deal of 2022, and the 10th deal in the autism and intellectual/developmental disability subsectors. This represents a decrease from the same time last year when there were 66 BHC transactions and 20 deals in the autism and intellectual/developmental disability subsectors.
