With 300 transactions behind us and a dozen dealmakers who have been through countless twists and turns in the contract process, we recently distilled that experience into ten critical terms that you want to see in any M&A contract:
- Allocating risk for seller contract assignments
- Providing accurate financial reps and warranties
- Managing balance sheet adjustments
- Securing reasonable escrow and holdbacks
- Ensuring liquidity when receiving publicly traded stock
- Managing potential dissident shareholders
- Avoiding delays due to disclosure schedules
- Ensuring seller control to meet earnouts
- Reducing variables between signing and closing
- Motivating the buyer to close
In addition to having 25 years of experience in M&A, I’m also an attorney, licensed in the state of Washington; but don’t worry—this series is certainly not aimed at attorneys. Instead, the following blog posts are designed for the CEOs who will need to manage the attorneys and the contract process during and M&A event. Watch this space for our upcoming series, "Ten Critical Terms in any M&A Contract.”