Hi guys,
Got an interesting opportunity as an internal M&A transaction associate at a consulting firm. They are owned by a LMM PE shop. Role was described to me as basically working on acquisitions by the target company.
I was wondering what the hours would be like here. I currently work in CDD consulting and my hours aren't bad (45-55). This opportunity would be a 30% pay bump.
I'm honestly not just chasing the money, I think my current role provides great work-life balance and I love it.
Does anyone have any sense of the hours on an internal industry M&A team?
Thanks!
Be careful with these. What I mean by that is some (read: rarely) portcos can operate as vehicles for the fund if they are sector specific and you can get a real investing experience which is combined with giving yourself real sector expertise. However, this is not usually the case and you will be a corp dev guy who is performing normal corp dev guy roles but now being overseen by a fund PE deal team who you'll need to report to etc. I just can't imagine being the guy having to conduct any kind of M&A transaction and then educating / teaching in some PE associate with incremental work burdened to you. The answer is really subjective to what you're looking for / what kind of LMM fund this is (sector-specific / generalist / what is their history investing in this particular portcos space etc)
Hours probably won't be too bad, but I'd worry more about the experience you'd be getting. There's a fair amount of risks in my opinion.
How big is the business? How many acquisitions have they done? What types/sizes of deals do they want to be doing?
It's kind of an odd hire to have a Corp Dev anayst at a LMM portco. Most of the time in the LMM the acquisitions would just be handled by the PE folks. If it did get down to the portco level, it would probably be the CFO/Head of finance running it. I work mostly with $30M+ businesses wth some in the $50M range and even with a buy and build, I can't imagine us saying "hey we really need a dedicated corp dev function at this company and we need to hire at the analyst level", again, could just be my fund specific experience.
The risk is that you go in there and in 6 months the winds change and the PE firm decides to be less agressive on Corp Dev or they decide that deals should be led at the PE level and you're stuck with low level work (ie put together a target list of acquisitions).
The potential upside is, if the company is significantly sized($100M+), they already have a decently built out Finance/Corp Dev team, and you get a good feeling that M&A is going to be the core strategy for growth, then you might pickup some decent M&A experience and could parlay that into bigger Corp Dev down the road.
I'd proceed with caution though.
I agree that it's highly unusual at the LMM level to have a dedicated M&A guy. How many acquisitions does the company plan to do?
You might mean more mid-market, say over $250M of revenue. If that's the case and they have a track record of doing M&A (for the portco) or lots of add-ons (the PE company) then that's a pretty great gig. Get to work with PE, work with M&A, be in the room for board and strategy discussions, etc. Gives you an excellent skillset that can translate to F500 corp dev or PE itself later on.
Voluptates iusto et alias odio et. Culpa voluptate recusandae distinctio eaque pariatur. Quod quis id eaque necessitatibus consectetur perferendis consequatur. Optio beatae et sint odit perspiciatis optio. Cupiditate quia sit rerum nostrum debitis ipsam id. Ipsam eum modi vero voluptatem aut explicabo.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...