
Ask HN: Questions to ask investors for professional services firm? - thr0wawayabc
so i started a boutique professional services firm some years back, and an investment firm has approached me who want to acquire it all and merge it with a bunch of other similar area firms.<p>Our company has no debt, 20 people, three global offices, all organic growth. We don&#x27;t &quot;NEED&quot; the investment, we are doing great, but this will skyrocket our potential growth.<p>What are some questions I should ask investors during our initial meet? What are things I need to watch out for?
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HenryTheHorse
Good for you. Raising money for a Prof. Services business is not easy
(acquisition is the more common route) but know that investment firms that
consolidate similar (or complementary businesses) under one umbrella have
their pros and cons. This is what you should be asking:

* Obviously, you need to understand their valuation model (EBITA-multiple, Revenue-multiple etc.)

* What's the operating model after the firms are merged? Who calls the shots? How many seats for you, the investors and the other founders (of other firms) on the board?

* What's the likely exit for the post-merger entity? (IPO is _extremely_ unlikely for a professional services firm in 2018.)

* How will your team be protected from potential merger shakeout? (Personnel in Accounting, HR etc are always the target in such mergers.)

* How will the merger affect your company culture?

* Will they be comfortable in letting you talk to other founders/CEOs as part of due diligence?

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shoo
not specifically about professional services firms, but potentially relevant:

"Ask HN: How to handle acquisition offer from a competitor?", 2012,
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3624505](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3624505)

"Ask HN: How do you deal with potential acquirers?", 2014,
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7074264](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7074264)

"Don't Talk to Corp Dev", 2015,
[http://paulgraham.com/corpdev.html](http://paulgraham.com/corpdev.html)

"Ask HN: What happened after acquisition?", 2016,
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12226915](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12226915)

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akulbe
I would love to talk to you about your firm, just to get some questions of my
own answered. Got time to chat?

