Business Owners

Acquisition Support

You may be pursuing strategic acquisitions as part of a medium term exit plan. Or you may not have specific plans to sell the business at all – your acquisition plans are strictly focused on growing and improving your business. Clarity can help.

We have supported dozens of acquisition initiatives among Diversified Industrial corporations and Private Equity Groups. This enables us to bring corporate caliber acquisition support to closely held private businesses.

Our Acquisition Support services can take a variety of shapes, depending on your situation:

Acquisition Prospect Development

Clarity works with you to define the acquisition criteria, such as target size, location, core competencies, and continuity of management. We then identify companies that fit the criteria, including a preliminary assessment of each target’s willingness to sell.

Pre Offer Support

Before you present a formal Expression of Interest, certain fact finding and analysis is prudent to confirm the basic justifications for the deal and to formulate a rough deal price and structure. For example, it is always worthwhile to analyze the cash flows, working capital requirements and other financial considerations. Or, you may want to understand how non-core segments of the business might be integrated with your own business, discontinued or sold.

Acquisition Due Diligence

Once you have settled on a deal, it starts to take a life of its own. The clock starts ticking on accounting, legal, environmental and market due diligence. Your emotional attachment to the deal may be reinforced by the time and money spent so far. That said, the deal is not done until it is done and smart buyers always pull the plug if the deal does not survive their careful and objective due diligence.

When working with Corporate and PEG buyers, Clarity generally applies a phased approach to our due diligence work. In Phase One we are supporting a Go/No-Go decision – seeking goodwill issues and other problems that may cause our client to scuttle the deal. Once a formal Letter of Intent is in place, it becomes increasingly difficult and costly to extricate yourself from the deal – so this Phase One is conducted on a fast track. Nearly half of the deals that Clarity has supported were ultimately abandoned during this phase.

Assuming that the deal survives due diligence, Phase Two focuses on final deal confirmation and negotiation support. Clarity can also support the post acquisition integration and otherwise help maximize the return on your investment.