Thurston Group completed a merger bringing SGA, Gen4 Dental Partners and Modis Dental Partners under one banner in June, according to a LinkedIn post dated September 24, 2026. The post describes the transaction as three platforms combining rather than a platform acquiring a practice. The amount was not disclosed in the sources.
The same post cites a second transaction: Great Lakes Dental Partners and Innovate 32, both backed by Shore Capital Partners, have also come together. It does not give terms for that combination either.
According to the post, the two transactions point to the same broader signal: consolidation in the dental services organization sector is beginning to happen at platform level, not only through the acquisition of individual practices. The post says that for years the pattern was a platform acquiring practices and growing larger, with integration of new locations into existing systems, standards and ways of working as the main leadership challenge. It states that groups are now combining with groups, and that DSOs are investing in de novo growth alongside acquisitions rather than instead of them.
The post adds that a single platform may be integrating an acquisition, building a de novo location and absorbing another group's operating model at the same time, and that these present three different leadership challenges running simultaneously inside one organization. It says an acquisition-led platform needs leaders who can integrate, a de novo-led platform needs leaders who can build, and a platform doing both while absorbing another group's culture and systems needs leaders who can hold all three at once.