Acquisitions—It’s a Buyer’s Market, But

Source: Accounting Today

Advice for buyers from consultant August Aquila ([email protected]).

• Determine whether the acquisition will enhance your most important strengths, or put the firm on a new course. The latter is risky.
• Before consummating the transaction, get to know the seller well.
• The person directing the process should be dispassionate, well versed in the legal and financial aspects of acquisitions, and able to devote considerable time.
• Don’t be ruled by emotion. Abandon the deal if it isn’t right.
• Assimilating the new firm is the most difficult part of the deal. Begin planning it early.
• Well before consummation, determine which people will stay, and tell them. People will be anxious about how the acquisition will affect them.
• The letter of intent is a useful vehicle for articulating terms of the acquisition. It should bar the seller from using it as a bargaining tool with other buyers.

From Accounting Today, May 21, 2007, SourceMedia Inc., One State Street Plaza, 27th Floor, New York, NY 10004, 800-221-1809. For the complete article, click on the following link: http://www.webcpa.com/current_issue.cfm?pub=ato, then select The Acquisition Proposition: 9 Things to Know.