[fraggle222]

I had to go back and look it was a while back, it took longer than I remembered it. The initial reach out was in May 2011. I had some initial conversation with them in May and June, sent them some overview of the company, etc. Then didn't hear back for a while. In December 2011 conversations started back up. By then the company had actually launched a product where they could see my business being useful. I sent them some small amount of data as a sample. I had actually proposed a simpler lower cost proposal of them just purchasing the data they wanted and not the business or acquiring me to work there. Anyway sometime at beginning of Feb 2012, things started to move faster and then it was done by beginning of March 2012. So in my mind/memory it was really January 2012 to beginning of March but really started in May 2011.

[haltingproblem]

Thanks for sharing the timeline. These things take far longer than anyone realizes.

[eitally]

Lots of times the process starts through some mid-level manager expressing interest in a possible m&a, and initiating what I'd call "casual" due diligence, along the lines of what the PP described. The issue here, from the target's pov, is that the person/team sponsoring the research/engagement isn't empowered to execute an acquisition -- ultimately, they're just performing research to build a business case that validates the viability of the purchase, and helps provides insights sufficient to guide the acquiring company's deal team on desirable base contract terms & structures. All this feels like it's an acquisition moving quickly to small companies that haven't been through it before, but it really isn't. Only after the corporate development analysts & attorneys get involved will it move quickly, but that's primarily for two reasons: 1) the due diligence is already largely completed, and 2) they hold the purse strings.

Note that it's pretty common for years to pass between the first and second stages of this process, and there are any number of reasons why acquisition negotiations can either suddenly accelerate (it becomes competitive, partnering isn't going to work as a fallback, the target is going out of business, the acquiring company needs to unload cash fast, ...) or slow down (partnering becomes more desirable than acquisition, 1st party development becomes competitive, various legal reasons intervene, business strategy shifts away from whatever made the acquisition interesting in the first place, org changes shift the focus away from the acquisition, ...).

[haltingproblem]

It would be very useful to know the percentage of completed deals. Is it 1% or 10% or higher? I think the number tends towards 1% rather than 10%. We (mostly) hear about successful deals and not unsuccessful ones which why this article is very valuable.