Group practicesTwo to nine locations · owner‑led

You do not have a reporting problem. You have a comparability problem.

Every location you acquired brought its own system and its own conventions. The board pack is still assembled by hand, nobody quite trusts the ranking, and the decisions that matter most (where the next operatory goes, who gets the bonus, which location gets your Thursday) are made against numbers that don't mean the same thing twice.

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3 of 14operating metrics defined the same way at every location

11 daysto close the month across the group

3 systemspractice‑management platforms inside six locations

A modelled group of six locations on three systems. Yours will differ; the shape rarely does.

One location?Start with the page written for one desk →Ten or more, or PE‑backed?The DSO page is about altitude and the LOI →

The comparability problem

The ranking changes when the definitions do.

Six locations, one metric, two conventions. The left column is what the board pack said. The right is the same six months read on one definition, with every adjustment itemised.

Illustrative: six locations across three practice‑management systems. Peach fell two or more places; teal rose two or more.

First → fifth

Cedar Falls

Reported gross of write‑offs. Once adjustments are applied the way the other five apply them, the best location in the group is the fifth.

Fourth → first

Ridgeline

Hygiene days were counted as provider days, halving the apparent output. On the group definition it is the strongest practice you own.

Sixth → sixth

Old Mill

Already on the group definition. The only location whose number meant what everyone assumed all six meant.

Two years of operator bonuses, regional attention and capital were allocated against the left‑hand column. None of the underlying practices changed.

Between three and five

The turn from dentist to operator has a location count.

It arrives between the third and the fifth practice, whether or not you planned for it. Three things change at once, and all three are settled by the same record.

01 · You stop being present

The check you made by walking in

At one or two locations you knew the numbers because you were in the building. Somewhere between three and five you aren't, and the owner's instinct that caught a wrong figure on a Tuesday has to be replaced by something that reads every location every day.

02 · The bank starts asking

Around two million of exposure

Lenders that were glad to fund the first two acquisitions get more careful at three to five locations and roughly $2M outstanding. The next facility is underwritten on numbers you can defend: by location, on one definition, with the rows behind them.

03 · A partner prices the difference

Turns of EBITDA, not decimals

Two to four owner‑dependent locations trade at 5–7× in 2026; five to nine with real management at 7–10×. Documented systems and comparable KPIs are worth one to three turns on their own. Comparability is not tidiness. It is the price.

5–7×two to four locations, owner‑dependent

7–10×five to nine, with a management layer

+1–3 turnsdocumented systems and comparable KPIs

−1–2 turnsone dentist above 35% of collections

2026 ranges for multi‑location dental groups as published by transaction advisors; a modelled illustration of how comparability is priced, not an offer or a valuation.

None of this needs an operations director you don't have yet. It needs one record that every location is measured against. That's the part we built first.

How the record is generated

Capital allocation

The same dollar, in two places.

One operatory slot. Placed where the reconciled record says it will earn, or placed where the regional average says it should. The difference is not a rounding error.

Placed where the evidence points$141,779annual contribution · Ridgeline, second operatory

Placed by regional average$1,552annual contribution · Cedar Falls, second operatory

What the engine returned · modelled group of fiveModelled

Opportunity before constraints$12,981,302

Defensible after limits$12,362,479

Recommendations rejected$97,000

Deferred for insufficient evidence91

Capital left undeployed on purpose$534,282

Simulated operating data. Every recommendation carries a predicted range, and every outcome is written back against it — including the misses. The engine is Investment Intelligence.

Half a million dollars sat unallocated on purpose. Because the record couldn't yet defend where it should go. That is what a decision system does that a dashboard never will.

Sequencing

Comparability first. Migration later, or never.

The reconciled view does not wait for anyone to change systems. It sits on top of the ones you have, and it is where the value arrives.

Phase one

Read everything where it sits

Weeks, not quarters

Read‑only adapters on every system you already run. Nothing moves, nothing is rewritten. The reconciled view appears on top of what you have.

Phase two

Operate on the reconciled view

Value arrives before any migration

Rankings, bonuses, the next operatory and the board pack all run on one definition, while every location keeps the system its team knows.

Phase three

Move locations when it suits them

Optional, and unscheduled

A location moves to Vella natively when there's a reason to: a renewal, a retirement, an acquisition that arrives with nothing worth keeping. Or never.

Some groups stop after phase two. Our commercial model does not depend on you migrating. It depends on the reconciled view being right.

How the adapter reads your systems

Control

Standards at the centre. Exceptions on the record.

A group of six is not a franchise. Each location has an owner, a team and a way of working that is mostly right. What the centre needs is one definition and a view of where a location has stepped off it, not a lock.

Policy is set once, at the group

Definitions, fee schedules, write‑off rules and what Vella may do on its own are decided centrally and apply everywhere.

Autonomy is set per location

Each practice keeps its own owner and its own settings. Group policy can limit what Vella does at a location. It cannot expand it.

Deviation is visible, not blocked

A location that works differently isn't stopped; it shows up as an exception on the record, with the reason, for a person to decide.

The audit trail is the same one you use

Every decision, every adjustment, every recommendation carries what was known, when, and who approved it. There is no second set of books for the group.

Fraud Guard

The check an owner used to make by being present.

Every dollar is matched three ways (chair against claim, claim against payment, payment against deposit) at every location, every day. Most of what it finds is an error, not a theft. When it isn't, you receive a case file rather than a conclusion, routed to you and the people you designate.

How Fraud Guard works →

Odds of an active scheme somewhere in the group

~45%at five locations

~2 in 3at nine

90%+at twenty

Modelled from Prosperident's 60% lifetime figure; the twenty‑location point is theirs.

See your own ranking.

Six locations or three, on one system or four. The assessment reads each practice where it sits and returns the group on one definition, including the places where the ranking you've been using was wrong.

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What it involvesRead‑only adapters on each system, credentials you create and can revoke, and a defined engagement with a price you see before we start.

What it producesOne definition across every location, with every adjustment itemised, and the ranking you should have had — with the rows behind each figure.

What you keepThe reconciled dataset, in open formats, whether or not you go further. Early groups also shape what gets built.

Two design‑partner seats are open for groups that want to shape the group surface with us — see the design partnership.

The scalable operating system that actually improves financial performance on its own.

Launching Q4, 2026

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