Practice 01
M&A advisory
You are selling, buying or being invested in. We run the process and write the documents, and we stay for the integration that decides whether the deal was worth doing.
This is the practice for
- the owner selling to trade or to private equity
- the buyer of a competitor, or of a bolt-on
- the team being acquired, and integrated afterwards
In this practice
Sell-side
Positioning, buyer identification, process management, negotiation and completion.
Buy-side
Origination, target assessment, diligence coordination, structuring and funding.
Transaction documents
Share and asset purchase agreements, warranties and disclosure, earn-outs and deferred consideration.
Post-deal integrationWhere we stay
We have run integrations from inside the acquirer: the systems, the people and the contracts, after completion.
A sale, stage by stage
What is still live at each stage, and where most engagements end.
Pick a stage to read its note.
What is still live at each stage, and where most engagements end.
You end up with
What you get at each stage.
01 · OriginationPreparation, structuring, strategy and the story the market will hear.
- Preparation, structuring and the story the market will hear
- A buyer and investor list built with you
- A senior adviser on the engagement for messaging, tactics and who says what
Before you start
What we would tell you before you start a sale.
The price is set before the buyer is chosen.
Positioning and the buyer list set the ceiling; the negotiation only decides how much of it you keep. The work that moves the number is done in the months before anyone is approached, and it is the part a seller is most tempted to skip.
Rehearse the diligence before a buyer runs it.
The customer contract with no change-of-control clause, the option grants nobody documented, the accounts that do not reconcile to the model: found by you, they are housekeeping. Found by the buyer under exclusivity, each one is a reason to chip the price.
The heads of terms are the negotiation.
By the time the long-form documents arrive, the shape is set: exclusivity, the price mechanism, what sits in the earn-out and what is warranted. Those are agreed in the heads, in a fortnight, and unwinding them later costs more than arguing them early.
The deal is earned in the year after completion.
We have run an integration from inside the acquirer. The systems, the people and the contracts have to be planned before completion, because afterwards nobody is waiting for a signature and the pressure of the process has gone. It is the stage most engagements never reach, and the one we stay for.
Work in this practice
Also in this practice
- Trade exitDrinksSale of Shandy Shack to SHS DrinksBrought in for the closing stages: review and negotiation of the share purchase agreement and the supporting documents.
- c.£50mPrivate equityExit to a major PE-backed acquirerThe largest recent mandate in the range, run from positioning onwards.
- Cross-borderAI marketing technologySale of QuMind to Largo.aiCross-border sale of a marketing technology business, run by ON from start to finish.
Mandates listed are those of the ON Consulting team, including work led at previous firms. Nothing on this page is advice or a recommendation, and past mandates are not an indication of future outcomes.
Who runs it
A partner who has lived it runs your mandate.
Your sale is run by a partner who has done it. We have been part of a team being acquired, led the integration from inside the acquirer, and run sale processes from the first approach to signing, on both sides of the table.
Meet the teamTell us where you are trying to get to.
Selling, buying, or being bought. The earlier the call, the more we can add. The first conversation costs nothing.