Having represented both buyers and sellers in mergers and acquisition transactions in Silicon Valley for more years than I care to admit, I have been through a number of closings. Some M&A closings that I have been involved in were smooth affairs, accomplished through an exchange of a single phone call with a confirming email, while others have stretched into all night marathons. Although it is often difficult to know whether your deal will allow you to finish at a reasonable time, there are a number of actions you can take to make sure your closing is as smooth and stress free as possible.
Obtain Third Party Consents:
The most important task for both the seller and acquirer is to plan ahead. Everything you will need, to accomplish the closing, will take longer than you think. One item which often delays a closing is getting the necessary consents to the transaction required from third parties. Certain third parties, often parties to major relationships that the acquired company, post-closing, requires for its operations, have rights under their contracts to consent to any change in control. Many of these contracts create significant value for the acquired company and their continued existence are often a key incentive for the buyer proceeding with the deal. It is best to identify these material agreements early on and plan a strategy for securing the necessary consents. Other areas where third party consents might be required are when a party, often a strategic investor, has a right of first refusal that is triggered by the transaction.
Obtain Stockholder Approval:
Stockholder approval, especially where large numbers of stockholders exist, can often be a gating item. As with third party consents, it is critical that the parties design a strategy early on for soliciting approvals from the stockholders, and, if necessary, investigate and resolve any securities compliance issues that might exist. This may require significant advance planning and document creation, particularly for securities compliance purposes.
Complete Agreements and Disclosure Schedules Before Closing:
Part of planning ahead is to front load all of the work that needs to be accomplished for the closing. For those transactions in which a closing follows sometime after the contract signing, agreements and schedules required for the closing, such as key employment agreements and disclosure schedules, should be completed and attached to the contract as part of signing. The temptation to put these types of schedules and agreements off until the closing can prove costly, as these types of documents, particularly a disclosure schedule, can raise issues which may require significant time to resolve.
Remove Contingencies:
As a closing approaches, it is critical to make sure all contingencies pertaining to the closing are removed or waived. One way to ensure this is to make sure, during contract negotiation, that contingencies are based on standards that are objective and easy to determine. One area that can be problematic is a contingency based on the occurrence of a material adverse effect. Because these tend to be very broadly and qualitatively designed, it is best to objectify them as much as possible. This can be accomplished by tying the effect to financial or other measures, or limiting it to known risk issues.
Have a Pre-Closing Review:
Expectations during this period need to be rational. If there is any deal term or contingency that is open, the transaction simply is not ready to close. For this reason, it is always a good idea for the deal team to conduct a pre-closing a few days before the planned closing date, to make sure all remaining issues and contingencies are resolved and that the documentation is sufficiently in order to close.
Be Closely Involved:
The most important task for the business executive is to understand that his or her job at this point in time is not necessarily to run the business, but to get the deal done. The executive needs to be closely involved with the transaction, and should not merely rely on his or her advisors. There is no substitute for carefully reviewing all of the documents involved in the transaction. In addition, the executive needs to ensure that the entire deal team be available for the inevitable last minute decisions.
Like many things in life, closings benefit from advanced planning and hard work early on. Save the surprises for birthdays and holidays. When it comes to closings, boring is best.
The information appearing in this article does not constitute legal advice or opinion. Such advice and opinion are provided by the firm only upon engagement with respect to specific factual situations. Specific questions relating to this article should be addressed directly to the author.