In M&A, you’ll often hear the term “deal process”. Not unreasonably, you might assume there’s a step-by-step template to follow to land a great outcome. The reality is quite different.  If you’re thinking of selling your business and the M&A advisors you meet give off a paint-by-numbers vibe, we’d suggest you make your excuses and look elsewhere. 

The people, the culture, back story and positioning, their clients, the commercial dynamics, as well as where a business sits in their sector, all combine to make every deal unique. That’s why there isn’t a single universal approach that guarantees success in getting a deal over the line.

In Waypoint’s recent US-based deal advising youth culture and experiential activation agency Archrival on their sale to Havas Play, successfully blending these elements was crucial in finding the perfect partner for a business that doesn’t sit neatly within the conventional agency categories. 

It was a partnership that felt entirely natural from every possible angle, with a shared vision, energy and enthusiasm across both buyer and seller that saw Archrival as a strategic centrepiece for Havas Play’s future US growth. 

But telling the story of the business was every bit as important as the analytical rigour that comes later in the process. Archrival is a unique business, essentially operating in a category of one; it defies labels in an industry that loves to assign everyone to a category. By their very nature, innovators will often forge success in a space others are yet to recognise. Part of the role of an advisor, therefore, is to help a business translate that uniqueness so that it resonates strongly with the desired buyer universe. That can sometimes involve deep positioning support, and we were equally at home talking the language of brand, as we were talking hard numbers across the negotiating table. So much so, that Archrival described us as ‘the Archrival equivalent’ in the M&A advisor world. We’ll happily take that!

Understanding and recognising who truly drives the operational performance of a business, and ensuring those senior leaders have a voice in strategic discussions from the outset, can be a vital determinant of transaction success.

A well-structured deal needs to appropriately recognise, reward and incentivise these individuals to establish the foundations for long-term growth and value creation. 
Unless you’ve done a deal yourself, there’s a good chance a lot of this will be new territory. Media headlines often lead on valuation and the post-sale wealth of the agency owners. It’s often seen as the sexy bit of deal making, but agreeing valuation and deal structure are just two pieces of the puzzle. If there isn’t trust and understanding built between buyer and seller, and solid alignment around the strategic rationale and cultural fit, the first obstacle can easily become the stumbling block.

As well as knowing the industry and its culture inside out, it’s vital to also be technically brilliant bankers. A practised M&A advisor shows their true worth in the heat of battle when things get tough, and they inevitably do during a highly emotive process such as selling a business. They understand people, interpersonal dynamics, how to bring parties together where power and influence lie, and crucially, how to adapt in real time to keep the train on the tracks, even if that involves some difficult conversations.

Archrival CEO & Founder Clint Runge said, “Waypoint treated our deal like their own, getting us far more value than we would have seen otherwise. We have worked with other M&A groups over the past five years…these guys are the best. Not only did they deliver a deal we are extremely happy about but were easy to work with the whole way.”

For further background on Archrival’s sale to Havas Play, see here.