H.I.G. Capital acquires Jake Rosen Entertainment for creator roll-up

By Sophie Lindqvist

H.I.G. Capital, which manages $76 billion, has formed Waveborn to acquire creator-economy companies. Its first acquisition is talent manager Jake Rosen Entertainment. The deal ran through H.I.G. Small-Cap & Growth, an arm of the firm. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Waveborn will build on JRE through acquisitions in three areas: brand relationships, content production and creator monetization. Neither company disclosed the size of the acquisition war chest. It cited Whalar Group as the type and scale of company it seeks to build: an enterprise spanning agency services, talent management and influencer technology.

Whalar was valued at $400 million in 2025. It sold its agency to Accenture Song earlier in 2026.

What drew H.I.G. into creator services?

Eric Tencer is managing director of H.I.G. Growth. He said IAB figures and family experience shaped his conviction.

“I’ve got a 10th grader and a 7th grader at home, and I’ve been fighting a losing battle around, ‘Why don’t you just watch normal TV or movies,’ they go straight to TikTok and Instagram,” he said.

The anecdote supplied personal conviction. The market data offered separate evidence. U.S. creator advertising spending is projected to hit $44 billion in 2026, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau. The bureau says ad spending in the category has grown four times as fast as media overall.

The entry reflects growing recognition of the creator economy among large financial buyers. Tencer said H.I.G. sees a fragmented market for services around creators. Creators were also building increasingly complex companies that require more expertise. He said talent management came first because creator relationships would reveal which adjacent services belonged on the growth roadmap.

JRE represents 400 mid-tier to macro lifestyle creators. Acquisitions could expand production, brand and monetization services across that roster. The plan aims to keep creators from switching agencies for missing capabilities.

What does the roll-up mean for creators and brands?

Jake Rosen said he wants creators to remain with JRE when competitors offer services it cannot. The acquisition plan expands the service menu around that roster.

Rosen remains bullish on the middle-income creators JRE serves. “A lot of brands on the high side do not want to risk their entire budget on one mega creator,” he said. Campaigns can also succeed with smaller creators. But placing 100 creators on one campaign transfers substantial work to the brand and agency.

For practitioners, the near-term effect is service consolidation, not a disclosed change in creator-ad pricing. Creators may gain more agency-backed capabilities. Brands still face the tradeoff between creator fit and campaign-management capacity.

Why are private equity firms moving in?

Private equity remains a small but growing financier in the creator economy, according to Quartermast founder James Creech. The firm did not work on the JRE deal.

His examples include Fixated, backed by Eldridge Industries, and Wonderloom Media, backed by Content Partners. Both became acquirers, echoing H.I.G.’s approach.

Creator businesses have traditionally missed private equity’s criteria for mature companies large enough to meet investment requirements. Strategic buyers, including ad holding companies and talent agencies, can often command higher prices. The roll-up structure lets financial buyers fund expansion before creator companies reach the scale that once made them ineligible for PE capital.

Rosen founded JRE in 2019, and it now has 25 employees. He began a sales process earlier in 2026. He chose the PE route to stay active in future M&A and shape growth. Corporate buyers had wanted him to adapt to their processes.

Rosen said he wanted a seat at the table and a voice in JRE’s future. Creech expects other growth-equity firms to follow H.I.G.’s approach by buying a core business and adding expansion capital, he said. He called the move evidence of continued maturation.

Quartermast counted 118 creator-economy deals in 2026 through the reporting period. All of 2025 produced 93. The advisory firm calls 2026 the busiest period on record.

If that pace holds, the next investment phase will test whether PE-backed roll-ups can widen creator services without weakening the brand relationships and campaign flexibility that make the model useful to advertisers.