Clearlake Capital Group, L.P.
Clearlake-backed PrimeSource Brands acquires Starborn Industries
Summary: PrimeSource Brands announced that it acquired Starborn Industries, with Clearlake Capital Group identified as PrimeSource's private-equity sponsor/backer. This is a portfolio-platform transaction signal rather than a Clearlake fund close, exit, performance update, or disclosure of transaction economics.
Why it matters: The update may matter to due-diligence readers as a source-attributed Clearlake portfolio-platform M&A signal, but it should not be used to infer valuation, ownership percentage, fund exposure, operating performance, acquisition quality, returns, or investment suitability.
Summary
PrimeSource Brands announced that it acquired Starborn Industries, a supplier of fasteners and related products for deck, fence, and construction applications. The accessible PrimeSource source identifies PrimeSource as backed by Clearlake Capital Group and describes Starborn as PrimeSource’s eleventh acquisition since partnering with Clearlake in December 2020.
This draft treats the PrimeSource announcement and PDF as the controlling accessible sources. It frames the item as sponsor-backed portfolio-platform M&A, not as a Clearlake fund close, exit, valuation event, performance update, or disclosure of transaction economics.
Why it matters
For due-diligence readers, the useful signal is Clearlake-backed PrimeSource continuing to add businesses through platform M&A. Sponsor-backed acquisition cadence can matter when readers monitor how a manager’s portfolio platforms are publicly described, what categories they are expanding into, and which operating themes appear in source-backed company announcements.
The signal is bounded. The source supports the PrimeSource/Starborn acquisition, Clearlake sponsor context, eleventh-acquisition language, and the statement that financial terms were not disclosed. It does not disclose the Clearlake fund or transaction vehicle, PrimeSource valuation, Clearlake ownership percentage, financing structure, acquisition multiple, operating performance, expected synergies, returns, or investment suitability.
Source notes
- PrimeSource news page: https://www.primesourcebp.com/news/
- PrimeSource PDF announcement: https://www.primesourcebp.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/PrimeSource-Brands-Acquires-Starborn-Industries.pdf
- Clearlake source page: https://clearlake.com/news/primesource-brands-acquires-starborn-industries/
- Source posture: PrimeSource’s accessible page/PDF is the controlling source if the Clearlake page remains behind a Cloudflare challenge. Attribute acquisition, company-description, executive-quote, acquisition-count, and undisclosed-terms language to PrimeSource/Clearlake public materials.
- Verifier posture: cleared for drafting with marker support for PrimeSource Brands, Starborn Industries, Clearlake, Clearlake backing, eleventh acquisition, and financial-terms language. No same-event local post or draft was found.
- Rights/source caveat: avoid relying on Business Wire from this run because verifier probes returned access-denied evidence.
9AT filing context
For identity and platform background only, public filing/profile context reviewed by 9AT maps Clearlake Capital Group, L.P. to a Santa Monica registered-adviser platform associated with clearlake.com, CRD 157920, and SEC file 801-73993. The reviewed profile context summarized about $83.6 billion in reported ADV regulatory AUM/profile scale, all returned as discretionary AUM, about $75.3 billion in total private-fund gross asset value across 147 private funds, 250 employees, 97 advisory employees, one filing company, and a latest profile submission date of June 30, 2026.
That context is broad sponsor/platform identity support only. It should not be used to identify the buyer, seller, financing source, beneficiary, transaction vehicle, valuation, ownership percentage, fund exposure, operating performance, or investment merit for the PrimeSource/Starborn transaction unless a public source independently says so.
No 13F or Form 5500 context is recommended for the article body. Clearlake’s public-equity reporting and employee-benefit plan filings do not explain PrimeSource, Starborn, acquisition economics, sponsor strategy, portfolio-company performance, or returns.
What to watch
Watch for future PrimeSource, Clearlake, portfolio-company, regulatory, or company materials that disclose integration details, leadership changes, additional acquisitions, debt or financing details, the relevant Clearlake vehicle if ever named, or any later exit or recapitalization event.
Future coverage should keep operating-synergy, acquisition-strategy, category-expansion, and platform-quality claims tied to public sources rather than deriving them from Clearlake filing context or from the fact of Clearlake sponsorship alone.