Strategic Guidance Across Your Transaction Lifecycle
Whether you’re acquiring a business, planning for an ownership transition or pursuing growth, PKF O’Connor Davies is here to help you move forward with clarity and confidence. Our professionals deliver actionable insights through comprehensive financial due diligence and investment banking support — helping you evaluate opportunities, understand risks and structure deals that support your immediate goals and long-term vision. We focus on what matters most to you: informed decisions, strategic outcomes and a clear path ahead.
With capabilities spanning tax, valuation, operations and technology, we offer a full suite of transaction advisory services paired with a specialized approach to due diligence, investment banking and financial services. If you’re preparing to sell, raise capital or integrate after a deal, our professionals can help you uncover opportunities, mitigate risk and position transactions for lasting value.
Meet Our Professionals
Our role is to help clients see the full picture — financial, operational and strategic — so they can make decisions that protect value and create opportunity.
Our Transaction Advisory Services
To help improve performance and increase value to business owners and founders, we assist companies in preparing to execute a transaction with optimal results for short- or long-term exit. The cornerstone of our services is strategic planning – defined by clear objectives – to identify potential buyers, define key performance indicators and establish transaction goals.
Common types of transactions include:
- Mergers
- Acquisitions
- Divestitures
- Management Buyouts (MBOs)
- Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs)
- Joint Ventures
- Spin-offs/Split-offs
Understanding a company’s true value is essential to any successful transaction. Our professionals leverage a robust business valuation process — analyzing financial statements, forecasts, market conditions and comparable transactions — to determine fair market value and identify potential synergies, risks and long-term financial implications. We also provide detailed financial modeling and strategic guidance, to support informed decision-making, enhance performance and increase deal certainty. As part of our comprehensive approach, we help develop growth plans, evaluate transaction timing and align with optimal market conditions to maximize value and reduce the risk of deal failure.
Acquisition Advisory
PKF O’Connor Davies helps mitigate the complexities of acquisition by providing specialized guidance to capitalize on strategic opportunities and increase competitive advantages through a comprehensive buy-side program. We formulate an acquisition strategy and identify search criteria to develop a list of potential organizations for acquisition, which are then targeted via marketing campaigns. Advising on relevant issues and the process as a whole, we help clients conduct comprehensive financial due diligence to evaluate a target company’s business, including financial performance, operational capabilities and risks. To aid in securing the optimal transaction, deals are structured and negotiated to reflect financing, tax implications and additional considerations.
Sell-Side Advisory
Our sell-side advisory services are designed to meet the specific needs of each client from preparation to closing the transaction. We conduct a thorough business analysis, consider potential business and buyer concerns, develop a growth plan, review financial performance, address tax matters and assemble a professional team. Our specialty in positioning EBITDA adjustments favorably often reduces re-trade opportunities, produces offers that will withstand buyer due diligence, accelerates time to close and increases value.
The search for potential buyers is global, and we create compelling marketing materials, financial models and narratives to attract promising candidates. Striving to make the negotiation process as smooth as possible, we advise on value, structure, terms and quality of buyers. Our financial due diligence exit opportunities approach ensures transactions are positioned for optimal outcomes. We then drive the closing process, coordinating with legal counsel and other professionals to resolve deal issues while ensuring all conditions are met within an agreed-upon timeframe, including formal milestones and deadlines.
Due Diligence
Our due diligence services, including pre-close due diligence, support confident decision-making by uncovering critical risks, validating performance and identifying opportunities for value creation. We offer specialized due diligence in key areas:
- Tax Due Diligence and Deal Structuring: Thorough tax due diligence and financial due diligence processes are crucial for helping an organization determine the viability of a merger while identifying potential tax liabilities that a target company may have. Our professionals help assess everything from historic filings and audit exposure to complex structuring considerations. We work with clients to identify optimal transaction structures that account for key tax implications, compliance needs and long-term planning opportunities.
- Financial Due Diligence: Our experienced professionals help corporations, investment advisors, private funds and other financial firms navigate the weighty M&A decision-making process. Our support includes validating financial statements, liabilities, tangible and intangible assets, along with assessing rationales for financial statements and associated representations and performing quality of earnings analyses. We provide clients with critical insights into financial risks, uncovering opportunities that support value creation.
- IT/Cyber Due Diligence: Our cybersecurity specialists excel at helping businesses protect networks, computers, programs and data from attack, damage or unauthorized access. They measure the security of IT environments by deploying a sophisticated proprietary investigative process and producing a comprehensive analysis that includes findings and recommendations for strengthening cybersecurity and privacy controls. Our investment banking technology knowledge ensures that IT infrastructure is aligned with strategic growth and security requirements. We perform extensive M&A Cybersecurity and Data Privacy Advisory services. For clients on the buy side, we help identify weaknesses that may lead to lower valuations. For those on the sell side, we help assure the program design and operational protections typically associated with higher valuations.
- Operational Due Diligence: A successful transaction requires a comprehensive understanding of operational risk and its impact on long-term value. Our operational due diligence services assist our clients in evaluating risks across fund investments, acquisitions and secondary market transactions. We assess everything from governance and compliance to financial controls and reputational risk, ensuring a thorough financial due diligence process. Leveraging our team’s experience in investment banking services and investment banking technology, we provide actionable insights to support value creation. Whether evaluating financial due diligence exit opportunities or integrating due diligence banking and financial services, our professionals are dedicated to ensuring your transaction is positioned for long-term success.
Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs)
For the shareholders, management and personnel of a privately held business, ESOPs are important exit planning vehicles that can help create liquidity, support business succession, increase the value of the business and generate substantial wealth for owners. Our specialists assist with every aspect of the transaction, from employee benefit and executive compensation analyses to plan design, recordkeeping and reporting. Our tax specialization is essential to addressing complex regulations.
Post-Merger Integration
After a merger, we provide guidance throughout every phase of integration to ensure a smooth transition and a clear view of your full financial landscape. To support early alignment and execution, we also offer the development of a 100-day time and action plan. The immediate goal of our experienced M&A advisory team is assisting with financial stabilization through comprehensive due diligence banking and financial services. As you move forward, we help you unify financial practices and processes, realize cost synergies, optimize performance, integrate technology and communicate transparently with stakeholders. Learn more about our post-merger integration services.
Explore Our Insights
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