Buddy and I recently wrote a chapter in the 14th volume of Advances in Mergers & Acquisitions, published last month. The book (and chapter) are a bit academic, but there’s some good content and ideas that might be of value as you think about M&A.
We find that private, middle-market companies that choose to implement mergers, acquisitions or growth strategies in today’s environment often face challenges when engaging with the capital markets, particularly when bridging the valuation gap between market values and owner values[1]. The chapter we wrote applies traditional corporate finance theory to the real-world dynamics of private, middle-market companies and outlines practical steps to shrink the value gap and increase transaction readiness.
For private, middle-market companies – those companies with annual revenues from $5 million to $1 billion – value creation is principally based on long-term, expected future cash flow. In practice, the activities that lead to value creation are nearly the same when preparing for a financing, a wave of growth or an M&A transaction. Owners of private companies tend to manage the business to minimize taxes and maximize the current cash benefit to the shareholders. While this approach makes sense in the short-term, it often over-weights decisions and strategies for immediate impact at the expense of what outside investors or lenders would consider long-term value creation. Many times, improving the realizable value of a company means shifting its approach and stance from one that is reactive to one that is proactive. Taking a proactive stance means, among other things, a company will tackle tough issues and instill disciplines like those on which an institutional investor would insist. A useful question for management to ask in readying their company for change is “What would a private equity buyer do to improve my business?” The answer to that question will likely provide keen insights and areas of focus, and is what we hope to provide in this chapter.
Essential to increasing the value of a company is increasing the amount and certainty of its cash flow while reducing the risk of achieving that cash flow. Optimizing the business should result in both a shift in the market value of the company towards the upper-end of valuation benchmarks and increase its alternatives (more buyers, cheaper capital, etc.) when engaging with the capital markets. Our discussion here hinges on those value levers most critical to the optimization of private, middle-market companies from the perspective of those in the capital markets, including institutional investors, lenders and buyers.
Keep in mind that strategic decisions need to be thought of and developed by aligning the company’s long-term growth strategy with the right leadership team, with the appropriate entity and organizational structure supported by scalable systems, and capitalized by the proper funding sources. Management must also consider changes to a company relative to its stage and life cycle within its specific market.
Calculating the value of a stream of cash flow can be viewed in mathematical terms by this simplified formula[2].
According to this equation, we can increase value by increasing the absolute value of the cash flow, reducing the cost of capital or increasing the rate of growth of the cash flow (or any combination of the three). Reducing the cost of capital is, in part, directly related to the risk of achieving that cash flow. To frame the discussion and apply some basic corporate finance concepts, we will look at value creation and optimization of a private, middle-market company as an exercise with three distinct types of value levers: (i) pursuit of strategies that increase the return on invested capital, (ii) pursuit of strategies that reduce the risk of investment in the company, and (iii) pursuit of tactics and strategies that ease the transfer and reduce the company specific risk of transitioning a business to new owners (whether transferred in part or in whole).
Certain businesses don’t generate positive cash flow in the early phase of their lifecycle but do create significant inherent value. From a buyer or investor perspective, these companies may have captured (or are capturing) a significant customer base or developing a technology that will eventually lead to relatively large and material cash flows. These core concepts still apply.
[1] Owner value is the value of the business interest to the current owner, considering the entire stream of value including both financial and personal considerations that accrue to his/her total economic benefit. The risk implied by owners to this value stream is usually less than what the market would otherwise impute, which exacerbates the valuation gap. [2]There are variations of this formula that account for fast growth businesses, and for those with negative short-term cash flow and positive long-term cash flow.
