Gavin Payne
Founder and CEO
Gavin brings ten years of market research, diligence and analysis experience to his projects. He specializes in market research, customer insights, competitive analysis and due diligence engagements.
Gavin has over a decade of experience in private equity and international consulting. Gavin worked for 5+ years with Bain & Company before launching Payne Enterprises, where he has served as CEO since the company’s founding in 2017. While at Bain, Gavin completed work in Bain's Private Equity practice where he conducted market research diligences for top PE firms across a range of industries. He has strong vertical experience in the retail, industrial, financial services, and telecom sectors, and a number of his projects included a digital component. He has worked out of Bain’s Chicago, Bangkok, Singapore, and Washington, DC offices and has conducted research for Payne Enterprises in China, Canada, India, and the United States.
Gavin earned an MBA, with distinction, from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics & Chinese from the University of Notre Dame. In his spare time, he enjoys reading, running, golfing, skiing, studying languages, cooking and spending time with family and friends.
Joe Walsh
Principal
Joe is a Principal at Payne Enterprises. Joe has been working as a strategy and private equity consultant since 2019, with experience at both at Payne Enterprises and Boston Consulting Group. While at BCG, Joe worked primarily within the private equity and tech practices. His work focused on market analysis, growth strategy, and assessment of competitive dynamics across tech, healthcare, and industrial goods industries. In addition to consulting, Joe also spent time as a Venture Associate at Manifold, a seed-stage venture capital firm, where he worked on the investment team evaluating technologies and business models.
Before becoming a consultant, Joe worked at W.L. Gore & Associates in project management, new product development, and technical business development. Joe holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management, along with both a Bachelors and Masters in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Delaware. Outside of work Joe enjoys spending time with his wife and daughter, playing basketball, golfing, skiing, and learning about new technologies.
Maitland Greer
Director buSINESS OPERATIONS
Maitland is the Director of Business Operations at Payne Enterprises. Prior to joining Payne, she was the Head of Strategic Programs at Burson Marsteller and ran pro-social initiatives, events and marketing campaigns for clients including McDonald’s, Kellogg, Barilla, Deloitte, James Beard Foundation and the Financial Times. She spent 5 years in Nickelodeon's Public Affairs department. She also worked in marketing at the Hearst Corporation and she was a contributor to Good Housekeeping, Woman’s Day, Redbook, Yahoo! and AOL during her time there.
She received her Bachelors of Arts in History at Colgate University and a Masters of Media Students at Parsons at the New School. She currently lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband and children. In her spare time she loves to read, ski and play tennis.
Malcolm Hicken
Senior Associate
Malcolm is a Senior Associate with Payne Enterprises. Malcolm has been an independent consultant for 10 years, focusing on market research and strategy projects for private equity and corporate clients. His work has covered a variety of sectors, including technology, energy, life sciences, and industrials.
Previously, Malcolm worked at McKinsey & Co. in the Houston office, focusing on strategy for energy clients. He holds a PhD in Physics from Harvard University and is fluent in Portuguese and Spanish. He lives with his wife and children in Idaho Falls and enjoys spending time in the nearby mountains and visiting family in Brazil.
Quinn Brown
Associate
Quinn is an Associate at Payne Enterprises. Previously, Quinn started the Strategy & Operations team at Sunbit, a FinTech unicorn based in Los Angeles. At Sunbit, Quinn led product strategy in their key verticals and drove growth initiatives for merchant partners. Prior to Sunbit, he worked in corporate strategy at Walmart and analytics at GreenSky Credit.
Quinn holds an MBA from Northwestern Kellogg, along with both a Masters in Accounting and Bachelors in Finance from Tulane University. In his spare time, Quinn enjoys playing basketball, hiking, surfing, and reading.
Sarah Lowe
Associate
Sarah is an Associate at Payne Enterprises. Previously, she worked as a brand manager at Nike, advancing marketing, retail, and digital strategies across various business segments. Her tenure at Nike was marked by leading innovative brand campaigns, orchestrating product launches, and crafting customer acquisition initiatives. This past summer, she served as a Summer Associate at Bain and Company.
Currently, Sarah is pursuing her MBA at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, focusing on Economics, General Management, and Strategic Management. An alumna of The Ohio State University, she distinguished herself both academically and as a student-athlete on the varsity Cross Country and Track Team.
Outside work and studies, Sarah relishes Chicago's culinary delights and avidly supports the Buckeyes.
Cole Brown
Associate
Cole is an Associate at Payne Enterprises in Chicago. He previously served as a product manager at Johnson & Johnson MedTech. In this role, he primarily focused on overseeing commercial launches of medical devices in the total joint orthopedics field, ensuring organizational alignment and market readiness. His duties encompassed demand planning, portfolio optimization, branding and messaging, Salesforce training, as well as customer targeting and engagement.
During the past summer, Cole worked as a Summer Associate at Simon Kucher & Partners in Chicago, Illinois. Concurrently, he is pursuing his MBA at the Kellogg School of Management. Cole earned his BS & MS in Biomedical Engineering from Arizona State University's Barrett Honors College. Beyond his academic and professional pursuits, he enjoys playing golf and soccer, cheering for Arizona sports teams, and exploring new restaurants in Chicago with his wife Allie.
Bianca Affatati Velasco
Associate
Bianca is an associate at Payne Enterprises and she is based in Chicago. Previously Bianca worked in strategy consulting for 3 years in Strategy& Peru and was part of the founding team of the Lima office. She worked in strategic planning and cost optimization projects across different industries such as healthcare, financial services, and technology. This past summer she worked at Boston Consulting Group in their Boston office.
Bianca holds a Business Bachelor from Universidad del Pacifico, in Lima, and is currently pursuing an MBA from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.