Banking | Finance 2024: JEAN STACK

A look at Baird’s defense and government sector business for 2023 shows that the year proved challenging, with merger and acquisitions down by 24%. Even so, the team managed to close 12 M&A transactions valued at more than $7 billion in aggregate. 

In 2024, Baird advised Herndon’s LinQuest, an engineering, data analytics and digital integration services company and a portfolio company of Madison Dearborn Partners, a Chicago-based private equity investment firm, on its sale to Texas-based KBR, a provider of engineering and technology solutions for governments and companies. The $737 million acquisition was announced in July. 

An organizer of Baird’s 6th Annual Defense & Government Conference, Stack spoke about the state of the market at the November 2023 event, which drew more than 1,000 executives. 

Before joining Baird, Stack worked for more than two decades in the government services, aerospace and defense sector at California-based investment bank Houlihan Lokey. She is a Duke University graduate who also studied at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Stack sits on the Inova Health and the Northern Virginia Technology Council boards.