TKO Partners was founded by Dr. Jerry Lanier, a General Practitioner and former U.S. Public Health Service dentist who has dedicated his career to expanding access to quality dental care. Over the last four decades, he built and sold Kids Dental Kare, launched the Kids2Dentist brand, and created Pedo4GP, a national training platform that empowers general dentists to confidently provide pediatric services. Dr. Lanier developed the scalable model, TKO Partners, a platform built on one guiding principle: Ownership powered by partnership.
Joia serves as Chief Executive Officer of TKO Partners. With a background in private equity M&A, and strategic operational experience across industries, Joia brings a data-driven, operator-focused approach to building durable platforms. She has led initiatives across acquisitions, integrations, financial strategy, and organizational design, with a consistent focus on building business infrastructure that enables long-term value creation. At TKO Partners, Joia is responsible for setting the firm’s strategic direction, overseeing partnerships and acquisitions, and building the systems and leadership team required to support dentists as they grow. Her philosophy is rooted in transparency, accountability, and partnership—ensuring clinicians can focus on patient care while TKO provides the tools, capital, and expertise to scale.
Teresa Hayrapetian serves as TKO Partners' Head of Operations, where she oversees multi-site operations, compliance, and strategic growth across the organization's dental practices. Teresa's career spans 30 years with extensive leadership experience in pediatric and orthodontic DSOs, building scalable systems, improving operational performance, leading large-scale integrations, and supporting doctors and teams to deliver consistent, high-quality patient care. Teresa brings operational vision, deep expertise in California regulatory requirements, payer relations, team leadership, and the skills to bring high-performing, patient-centered dental operations to the TKO Partners team.
Dr. Tucker is a board-certified pediatric dentist and serves as Kids2Dentist’s Clinical Director. With more than 15 years of clinical experience, he is dedicated to delivering high-quality, patient-centered dental care. Known for his compassionate approach and commitment to clinical excellence, Dr. Tucker remains actively engaged with the latest advancements in pediatric dentistry to ensure the highest standards of care for the patients and families he serves. Dr. Tucker earned his Doctor of Dental Surgery degree from Meharry Medical College School of Dentistry in Nashville, Tennessee, and completed his pediatric dental residency at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. He is a Diplomate of the American Board of Pediatric Dentistry and serves as an Associate Professor of Pediatric Dentistry at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, where he contributes to the education and mentorship of future clinicians.
