KSM
Tax, Assurance, & Advisory Services — built for the transportation industry.
KSM is the full-service accounting and advisory arm behind FreightMath. Eight decades of transportation-industry focus, approximately 200 carrier clients across North America, and a fully integrated tax, assurance, and business advisory team under one roof.
Diligence-Grade Heritage
The accounting firm the industry actually uses.
Three Pillars, One Firm
Tax. Assurance. Advisory.
KSM organizes its transportation practice around three service pillars — delivered by the same industry-focused team, without the seams that come with switching firms between the tax return, the audit opinion, and the deal.
Tax
Federal, state & local, and specialty tax for asset-heavy operators.
Federal and multistate tax planning and compliance, indirect tax, credits and incentives, R&D, cost segregation, and international tax. Purpose-built for transportation, logistics, and other asset-heavy businesses where the tax bill moves with the equipment.
Assurance
Audit, review, and compilation you can put in front of a lender.
Financial statement audits, reviews, and compilations executed by teams that understand trucking, warehousing, and freight-forwarding operating models. Lender-ready, covenant-aware, and integrated with the KSM tax and advisory teams working the same account.
Advisory Services
Strategic support for growth, transition, and long-term value.
Transaction advisory, quality of earnings, ESOP advisory, investment banking, outsourced finance and accounting, and business valuation — delivered by professionals who understand the transportation industry.
Advisory Services Deep Dive
Strategic advisory services, delivered by an industry team.
The transportation industry has its own accounting patterns, its own operating metrics, and its own valuation drivers. KSM's advisory services are built for them — not generalized from other industries.
Due Diligence
Quality of Earnings, tax, and IT diligence
Quality-of-earnings analysis that isolates true, recurring earnings and identifies value drivers. Tax exposure and structure review, working capital normalization, and IT diligence covering systems, integration risk, and synergy cost. Buy-side and sell-side.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Valuation
Deals, ESOPs, estate, litigation, reporting
Business valuation for M&A, ESOP fairness opinions and annual updates, estate and gift planning, financial reporting (fair value, impairment), and litigation support. Delivered by accredited valuation professionals backed by a firm with more than 80+ years of experience.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →ESOP
Feasibility, structuring, and ongoing advisory
Feasibility studies, transaction structuring, annual valuation, plan audit, ESOP accounting, and ongoing board and executive advisory. KSM has been employee-owned since 2001 — we advise ESOPs the way we run one.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Outsourced Finance & Accounting
Controller, CFO, and back-office as a service
Outsourced controller and CFO support, month-end close, AP/AR, payroll, and monthly financial reporting — for operators scaling beyond a single-controller function, or owners who want KSM’s transportation-industry lens on the numbers every month.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Intelligent Technology Services
vCIO, cybersecurity, cloud, AI & automation
KSM’s Intelligent Technology Services Group (ITSG) — a unified managed technology practice: vCIO-led IT strategy and governance, proactive monitoring, cybersecurity, cloud and application modernization, and AI-driven automation. Delivered through a Consult, Implement, Operate model that turns IT strategy into measurable business outcomes for transportation and asset-heavy operators.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Investment Banking
Sell-side, buy-side, capital raises
Middle-market investment banking and M&A advisory — sell-side representation, buy-side search, recapitalization, and capital raises. Clients receive senior-level attention and access to deep buyer, lender, and private equity relationships.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →State & Local Tax
Multistate tax exposure & incentives
Sales and use tax exposure, income and franchise tax, property tax, unclaimed property, location advisory and incentive negotiation, and strategic multistate tax reviews — helping transportation companies manage risk and make informed decisions around equipment, facilities, and expansion.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Transportation Industry Practice
80+ years, 200 carrier clients
A dedicated transportation team providing accounting, tax, and advisory services tailored to carriers, logistics companies, freight forwarders, and other industry operators. KSM also delivers benchmarking, industry education, thought leadership, and opportunities for transportation leaders to connect and share insights.
Learn more on ksmcpa.com →Why Operators Engage KSM
What the industry knows KSM for.
Largest transportation-focused accounting firm in the country.
Eight decades of continuous focus on trucking, logistics, and freight-forwarding — with approximately 200 North American carrier clients and dedicated industry teams across tax, assurance, and advisory.
Integrated with FreightMath, MapLedger, and Quality of Freight.
The same operating-data lens that powers FreightMath diligence engagements sits inside the KSM transaction advisory and assurance workstreams — cost-to-serve, network durability, and freight-at-risk read straight from the load-level data.
Employee-owned since 2001.
KSM has offered an ESOP for two decades. That informs how we advise founders on succession, structure, and the operating discipline of running an employee-owned company year over year.
Middle-market M&A firepower.
KSM Corporate Finance, our dedicated investment banking team, brings senior-banker attention to sell-side, buy-side, recap, and capital-raise mandates for family-owned, sponsor-backed, and strategic operators.
One Team, Two Sides of the Table
The operating data feeds the accounting and the deal.
FreightMath is the operating-data lens; KSM is the accounting, tax, and advisory firm that acts on it. Cost-to-serve, freight-at-risk, and network durability aren't bolted onto a KSM engagement — they're inside it. That's how due diligence, valuation, ESOP fairness opinions, and audit teams get to a defensible answer faster than the market.
Go Direct
Every service, straight to the KSM page.
Prefer the source? Every practice above lives on ksmcpa.com with full team bios, engagement examples, and contact partners.
- Transportation Industry Practiceksmcpa.com/industries/transportation →
- Investment Bankingksmcpa.com/services/advisory/investment-banking →
- Due Diligence & Quality of Earningsksmcpa.com/services/advisory/transaction-advisory/due-diligence →
- Valuation Servicesksmcpa.com/services/advisory/valuations →
- ESOP Advisoryksmcpa.com/services/advisory/esop →
- Outsourced Finance & Accountingksmcpa.com/services/advisory/outsourced-finance-accounting →
- Intelligent Technology Services (ITSG)ksmcpa.com/services/advisory/intelligent-technology-services →
- State & Local Tax (SALT)ksmcpa.com/services/tax/state-local-tax →
Engage
Bring in the firm the industry uses.
Whether you're preparing to sell, buying a target, refreshing an ESOP valuation, defending a multistate tax position, or standing up a lender-ready audit — KSM's transportation team is one call.