Anyone with even a basic idea of Mergers and Acquisitions knows how big of a deal it is. It is complex enough to handle one company but to handle two and to merge its resource is just as cumbersome as it sounds. From technical issue to the legal ones, there are roadblocks in the way just waiting to happen. It is no surprise in such a situation that the companies might want to lawyer up and prepare themselves to be protected under the law. Plus, there are a lot of legal procedures and proceedings to be taken care of which can be taken care of none but an experienced professional lawyer. When it is about business, you might not want to take risk with anyone but the best. You need to know how to pick them right. These are 5 helpful tips on how one can find top mergers and acquisitions law firms:
1. Experts know the best
People are not called experts for anything. Before you choose which law firm to put your trust on to handle the legal dealings of mergers and acquisitions, you need to know how to choose the best one. For that, the best kinds of a company pertaining to different departments should be brought about and formed as a team. This team of experts be entrusted to do the needed research to find the best law firms that can best safeguard the interest of the business of their corresponding areas. Since corporate steps like a merger is important for all the departments, the law firm should also be well-equipped with lawyers well-versed with the legal requirements of each of them.
2. The experience of the lead and junior attorneys
Usually, the workload of a case is so high that mergers and acquisitions law firms assign not just one but a team of lawyers to work on the case. The lead attorney is chiefly responsible for making decisions and integrating responsibility while the junior attorneys handle the groundwork and the clients. Specialization in each of the departments of a company is required and so apart from the lead attorney, the reputation and experience of the attorneys in specialized divisions should be looked into. Mostly, a senior partner of the law firms in India is given the position of the lead attorney. Though they are trustworthy and have potential, it does not hurt to see their worth for yourself before taking the big step of hiring them.
3. Take the career path of the lawyers in consideration
You might want to know your lawyers in-depth before you assign them a job of handling mergers and acquisitions. Though top mergers and acquisitions law firms will not allow an amateur to handle cases like these, there is much conjecture about the degree of specialization that the lawyers has through the years. A lawyer goes through a lot of level of jobs while gaining experience in a firm and the depth in which a lawyer has knowledge about a particular field or area of operation can be guessed by the work he has been assigned to in the past. Greater the number of cases involving complications of that department, greater will be his understanding of the law of that area and their legal requirements too.
4. How frequently are those lawyers assigned to similar cases
If mergers and acquisitions law firms cannot trust their own lawyer to take over a case, how can we? The degree of faith that a law firm has on a particular lawyer is brought to light by the amount of complications that they have to deal with in the case and the specialized area the case pertains to. More number of complications and specialized cases demand none but the best lawyers to work through the knots. The frequency with which the law firm has assigned similar cases to the lawyers who can potentially be assigned to your case for Mergers and Acquisitions should be brought to focus. Only a part-time work experience in your field of need will not be good enough to seal the deal.
5. Past records of cases
Nothing speaks louder and clearer than numbers and numbers do not lie. One can easily verify the effectiveness of a lawyer by going through a record of his or her past cases. The power of attorney to negotiate and to bring the other party to agree to the terms which benefit their clients more is always a sign of a good lawyer. The number of success vs failures is also a good enough ratio to compare the lawyers and their competencies. It should be noted here that one of the cases that resemble the cases of mergers and acquisitions should be taken into account. Brining in all the cases of a lawyer might be appropriate for overall success rate but for special cases, only specific cases should be taken into account.