Questions we get asked
Straight answers, before you have to ask for them.
Everything corporate development leads and investors ask us on the first call: who does the work, how many deals we can carry, how we price, how fast we move, and what the named methods actually mean.
For corporate development teams
Who actually does the work on a Beyond M&A engagement?
The partners you meet on the first call. Beyond M&A is deliberately small, so the people whose names are on the report are the people who ran technology functions in PE-backed businesses. Nobody is handed down to a team you have not met.
How many deals can Beyond M&A carry at once?
Ten diligences a month is the capacity we hold, so several deals in one programme can run in parallel. We size the pipeline with you in advance, which is how the pace holds when the tap does not stop.
What does Beyond M&A do that a diligence report does not?
Post-merger integration is the practice we are built around. The same people who wrote the diligence run Day 1 readiness, exit from transitional services, consolidation and the savings the deal was priced on.
Why use an adviser when we have an in-house M&A team?
Most in-house teams have the process and not the technical depth, or the depth and not the capacity. We work alongside the team, leave the templates behind and expect to be needed less on each subsequent deal.
For investors
What is technology due diligence?
Technology due diligence is an assessment of whether a target's technology, team and spend can carry the investment case. Beyond M&A covers twelve scope areas and returns a costed roadmap a non-technical reader can act on.
How is the scope sized?
In proportion to the deal. We check the foundations first, then scope only what the decision needs. Where a smaller piece of work is the right answer, we say so before the proposal.
Do the recommendations come with costs attached?
Yes. Every finding carries a number, an owner and a timing, so the investment committee can price it rather than read it. Integration is costed at diligence, not discovered after completion.
How does Beyond M&A treat AI in a target?
As something to judge rather than describe. We test whether the AI position holds, price it, and apply that judgement to an estate we may then have to integrate and run.
Buying this kind of help for the first time
We have done acquisitions before but never used a firm like Beyond M&A. Where do we start?
With a free working session on the deal in front of you. A couple of hours, no invoice and no obligation, at the end of which you know what the first useful piece of work is and roughly what it costs.
What does the first paid piece of work look like?
Small, specific and fixed price, agreed in writing before it starts. There is no retainer and no minimum term, and every stage after that is a decision you make rather than something that rolls on.
How do we stop this becoming a permanent consultancy relationship?
By design, it cannot be. Beyond M&A works inside your team, leaves the templates and trackers behind, and expects to be needed less on each subsequent deal. Notice terms are agreed before the work starts.
How is confidential deal information handled?
Beyond M&A is ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified, and an NDA is in place before anything sensitive is shared. Professional indemnity cover is in place, with details available on request.
Could Beyond M&A work for the other side of our deal?
No. We do not work both sides of a transaction, and we say so at the first sign a conflict could arise. Only three mergers run simultaneously, so the position is easy to check.
Can we speak to someone who has used Beyond M&A?
Yes. Sponsors at comparable acquirers who have been through diligence and integration with us are available for a reference call on request.
Carve-outs and complex deals
What is a carve-out in technology terms?
A carve-out separates a business unit from a parent whose systems, licences, data and people were never designed to come apart. The technology work is to establish what the unit actually uses, what the parent will stop providing, and what it costs to stand the unit up on its own.
What is a transitional services agreement and why does it matter?
A transitional services agreement is the arrangement under which the seller keeps running systems for the separated business for a fixed period. It matters because the exit date is a hard cost deadline: every service still running past it is either an extension fee or an outage.
How long does a carve-out separation take?
Separation is usually measured in months rather than weeks, and the schedule is set by the transitional services exit rather than by completion. Beyond M&A costs the separation during diligence so the timetable is priced before signing rather than discovered after.
What goes wrong most often in a carve-out?
Shared systems and shared people. Licences that cannot transfer, data that cannot be cleanly split, and a handful of individuals in the parent who quietly hold the unit together. Each of those carries a number, an owner and a date in our findings.
Who does the work on an international carve-out?
The same team that ran the diligence carries the separation through MERGE: Map, Estimate, Realise, Go Live, Evolve. Ten diligences a month is the capacity we hold on purpose, so the people who priced the separation are the people who deliver it.
Pricing, turnaround and working with us
How does Beyond M&A price its work?
Fixed fees scoped to the deal, agreed before work starts, with no time-and-materials drift. Programme pricing is available where a pipeline of repeat acquisitions is running.
How fast can Beyond M&A move?
Structured to the pace of your pipeline, so diligence is not the reason a deal slips. Short-burst dedicated resource can be added to put energy back into a programme that has stalled.
What is it like to work with the team?
You get partner-level people inside the process rather than reporting into it, same-day responses, and someone on the end of the phone when something breaks outside office hours.
Who is Beyond M&A not right for?
Anyone who needs a single commodity diligence report at the lowest price on the market. That is a real requirement and there are firms built for it. We will say so on the first call rather than after the proposal.
The method and the language we use
What is MERGE?
MERGE is Beyond M&A's method for technology in a deal: Map, Estimate, Realise, Go Live, Evolve. One team carries it from first look through Day One to value creation, and what one deal teaches goes into the next.
What does TIE stand for?
Truth, Immediacy, Efficacy. Truth is the unvarnished position of the estate, Immediacy is what has to be dealt with now, and Efficacy is whether the plan can be delivered by the team that owns it.
What are the twelve scope areas?
Twelve areas covering architecture, code and IP, data, security, infrastructure, delivery, team and operating model, spend, obsolescence, resilience, scalability and AI position. Scope is sized to the deal rather than applied as a blanket template.
What does Them and Us mean?
Them and Us is the pattern where an acquired business is integrated on paper but never culturally, so two organisations keep operating inside one company long after completion. Beyond M&A assesses it, predicts the friction and fixes the estate you already own.
Still a question we have not answered?
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