Umaize Savani · Consultant & Investor · Ohio

Some people collect watches or paintings. I collect well-run businesses.

I build, buy, and advise businesses you can touch, and back the technology that serves them. Good operating is a craft, and I've been practicing it my whole life.

Read on

How I work

Three chapters, one throughline: the operator's view.

Judgment you can borrow.

I take on a handful of engagements a year with owner-operated businesses. The work lives where value is quietly made or lost: pricing power and unit economics, working capital, hiring and incentives, and the operating cadence that turns a strategy into a normal Tuesday.

Most advice describes your problem back to you at a markup. Mine starts where the textbook ends, because I've sat in the owner's seat: the constraint is rarely the idea. It's cash conversion, incentives, and follow-through.

A few engagements a year, by referral

Patient capital, from Main Street to software.

I collect good businesses the way some people collect watches: real estate, operating companies, and early-stage technology built for the businesses I understand. Durable demand, honest books, founders who sweat the details.

I'm not a fund and I don't flip. I buy things I'd be proud to own for decades, and I've never sold anything I loved.

I'll always look at something interesting

Software that does honest work.

The best product ideas I've found weren't found at all. They were problems I tripped over while running my own businesses.

So I build practical AI for small businesses, where software has to earn its keep in dollars, not demos. The first product answers every inbound lead in seconds, because speed to reply is the cheapest revenue there is.

Currently in market with Otto AI

A well-run business is a quiet thing. No drama, no fires, just a thousand small decisions made right.

The scoreboard

Since it exists, it may as well be good.

7 figures

Added to the bottom line at Ideal Cars after modernizing payments, underwriting, and operations.

5.0

Google rating at Ohio Cars, across every review the dealership has ever received.

40 yrs

Of family operating history behind the playbook. Second generation, Ohio-built.

Happy to walk through any of these in detail. The numbers are more fun with the stories attached.

The record

Built, bought, and kept.

Now

Ohio Cars

An independent dealership in Mason that I own and operate. Data-driven inventory, disciplined buying, and a perfect Google rating. ohiocars.com

Now

Ideal Cars

Our family's Buy Here Pay Here dealership in Hamilton, founded by my father. I'm the second generation, modernizing payments, underwriting, and operations. idealcarsohio.com

Now

Real estate

A quiet portfolio of rental property in southwest Ohio. Old buildings, long holds, no hurry.

Now

Otto AI

AI lead response software for independent dealerships, built from a problem I live daily. ottodealers.ai

Before

The foundation

Talent Solutions at LinkedIn. Finance and International Business at UC's Lindner College of Business, where I served as the university's first Muslim Student Body Vice President. An independent design practice since 2014.

House rules

Learned, not borrowed.

I.

Buy right, and the selling takes care of itself.

II.

The deal you walk away from is the only free one.

III.

Never be in a hurry to get rich. Never be in a hurry, period.

IV.

If the books need explaining, the answer is no.

V.

Take care of people on the worst day of the deal, not the best one.

VI.

Reputation compounds faster than money.

VII.

Every business is a people business wearing a costume.

VIII.

Love the work, or leave the game.

Some of these are my father's. The rest cost me money to learn.

After hours

Business is the day job. Writing is how I think.

I write and produce a show, released episode by episode on YouTube.

Placeholder copy: two or three sentences on what the show is about and why you make it. Send me the details and this becomes real.

Watch the episodes →

The latest episodeEp. 01

A short letter

Instead of an about page.

Hello,

I grew up around the car business. My father has spent four decades in Ohio dealerships, and I learned early that a small business runs on relationships, trust, and a thousand small decisions nobody sees.

After studying finance at the University of Cincinnati and a stretch at LinkedIn, I came home to build. First in the family business, then in property, then in software, then in words. Somewhere along the way, other owners started asking how I ran things, and the consulting practice grew out of those conversations.

I'm fortunate to be at the point where I get to choose my work, and I choose the things I'd do anyway. Businesses I'd be proud to own, problems worth turning over, people worth building alongside. When I'm not working, I'm usually playing basketball or with family and friends.

If you're working on something interesting, I'd genuinely love to hear about it.

With respect,

Umaize

Contact

The fastest way to reach me is email.

A business worth talking about, a deal worth seeing, an idea worth arguing over. I read everything, and the interesting notes get answers fast.

Designed and built by hand in Ohio. Set in Newsreader and Archivo.
The engravings are drawn live in code, and are never the same twice.