Sale & Succession
You only sell well once. We prepare the business and its owner, then run the transaction through to closing.
Preparation, valuation, process structuring, buyer identification, negotiation and closing: six steps, one logic — your financial and personal objectives.
Preparation
A sale is prepared before it is launched. Twelve to twenty-four months ahead, we identify what erodes value or complicates the process: owner dependency, customer concentration, reporting quality, and latent employment, legal or tax issues.
We also prepare the owner: wealth objectives, role after the deal, acceptable timetable and red lines. A prepared seller negotiates; a rushed seller concedes.
Valuation
We objectify value by cross-checking methods and bridge it to the equity price: net debt, normative working capital, adjustments and any earn-out.
That value is not a headline figure: it is a reasoned, documented position that holds up in front of buyers and their advisers.
Process structuring
Restricted process or auction, timetable, phasing, confidentiality: we choose the format that serves your objectives, not the one that flatters the mandate.
We produce the process material: teaser, information memorandum, business plan, data room and Q&A matrix.
Buyer identification
We map the relevant counterparties: French and international trade buyers, investment funds, family offices, individual buyers and, where relevant, internal acquirers.
Each target is qualified on strategic logic, financial capacity and culture. The best buyer is not always the one quoting the highest price: it is the one who delivers it.
Negotiation
We assess offers beyond price: payment structure, warranties, adjustment clauses, transition period requested, post-closing commitments and execution certainty.
We run the negotiation, keeping competitive tension alive while preserving the relationship, through to the letter of intent and the final agreements.
Closing
Due diligence, coordination of legal, tax and wealth advisers, conditions precedent, buyer financing: we steer the final stretch, the one where deals are most often lost.
We stay involved until the transfer is complete and, where useful, throughout the owner's transition period.
The specific case of succession
- A gradual or outright exit, at the pace the owner chooses.
- Family succession, internal buy-out or management package.
- Structuring the buy-out financing and the related guarantees.
- Coordination with wealth, tax and legal advisers.