English Bus/Financial Management merger

As Bassi, Mays, and Trustey all note, the most successful corporate acquirers and private equity companies adopt formal checks and balances to make sure their assessment of a target is on the money. An investment committee, which has no involvement in the day-to-day examination of the proposed acquisition, may be charged with making the final decision. Some acquirers have discovered that a food way of keeping a dispassionate eye on things is to put together a decision-making body of trusted individuals who are less attached to the deal than the deal’s proponents in senior management may be. Going a step further, some companies assign a “red team” to every serious deal prospect. The job of the red team? To play devil’s advocate, and try to kill the deal at every turn.