Prominent Spokane-based real estate brokerage NAI Black and Spokane technology entrepreneur Greg Green have formed a merger-and-acquisition unit within the brokerage's commercial division, says NAI Black CEO Dave Black.

The joint venture will draw from Greg Green's experience in investment banking, venture capital, and public markets through his background in buying and selling technology companies, Green and Black say in a joint statement. The venture also will tap resources available to NAI Black through its affiliation with Princeton, N.J.-based NAI Global, a network of independent commercial real estate brokerages, they add.

"Over the years, our commercial real estate business has seen a need for serving middle- to large-market companies that to date have been served out of Seattle or other cities," Black says.

The newly created entity will serve business owners, Inland Northwest accounting firms, and financial-management groups, and will help clients with mergers, acquisitions, and succession planning, he says.

Green, who also heads up a company called Greg Green Associates, says he'll work with clients who want to buy or sell businesses.

"At the end of the day, a lot of people don't know how to sell their companies," he says. "I've probably bought and sold 50 companies. I'm looking to help people with that."

He has founded a number of Northwest concerns, including Tahoe Inc., a two-year-old technology startup that operates as a Web-development and media-content company delivering service throughout the U.S. He also founded OneEighty Networks Inc., in 1998, and Tel-West Communications Inc., in 1986, both of which were acquired by larger companies in which Green took executive roles.

NAI Black handles retail, office, industrial, corporate, and government real estate transactions and property-management services throughout the Inland Northwest directly, and across the U.S. and internationally through its affiliation with NAI Global.