PE money is a mixed bag. To lump it all in that they are all bad and LAB is going to crap is inaccurate. If you're the sole owners of LAB and the demand is where it's at and to fulfill it and future demand you have to take out massive loans that may require personal guarantees, do you do that? Or do you take on private investors to take on that risk. The term PE can be so broad as it could be Blackrock, Berkshire, or 4-6 wealthy individuals/families that like golf and the financials. My suspicion is for them to keep up with demand the amount of debt they'd have to take on to ramp up production is not the risk level they were comfortable with. Also, sometimes PE money can come in and streamline some efficiencies and implement processes that individual owners can't or won't implement.
I suspect we'll hear something from Sam Hahn soon. Seems to be a very transparent guy.