Due Diligence
Sellers package. Buyers underwrite. Our job is what's true underneath. Commercial, financial, and operational due diligence for acquirers, and diligence readiness for sellers who would rather find their own issues first.
LePrince Group provides due diligence for mid-market M&A globally: commercial, financial, and operational diligence for acquirers, and sell-side diligence readiness for companies preparing to sell.
Deals are not lost at signing. They are lost in what signing missed.
Every disappointing acquisition has the same autopsy: something true about the business that diligence did not surface, or surfaced and did not price. And every discounted sale has the mirror image: an issue the seller could have fixed quietly, found loudly by the buyer instead.
We run diligence from operating experience. We have been inside businesses, on both sides of a transaction, so we know where the gaps hide and which of them actually matter to value.
Three streams. One question: what is actually true?
Buy-side diligence that protects the thesis, not just the file.
Commercial due diligence
Demand durability, customer concentration, competitive position, pricing power, and whether the growth story survives contact with the market. The stream that kills bad deals earliest and cheapest.
Financial due diligence
Quality of earnings, revenue recognition, margin reality after promotions and channel costs, working capital behavior, and the adjustments the seller's EBITDA quietly absorbed.
Operational due diligence
The team, the systems, the dependencies. Whether the business runs on infrastructure or on the founder's memory, and what it costs to fix the difference.
Diligence yourself before a buyer does it for you.
The cheapest issues to fix are the ones a buyer never finds. Our sell-side diligence readiness work examines your business the way an acquirer will: earnings quality, contracts, concentration, compliance, working capital, and closes the gaps before the data room opens. It is the de-risking core of exit readiness, and it is the difference between a process that holds its price and one that gets chipped through confirmatory diligence.
Diligence is only useful if it changes the deal.
A finding that does not move price, structure, or protections is trivia. We translate diligence into terms: price adjustments where risk is real, earnouts and holdbacks where uncertainty needs bridging, reps and warranties where facts need standing behind. The work connects directly to buy-side advisory and deal structuring.
Frequently asked questions.
What does due diligence cover in a mid-market deal?
Three core streams: commercial (demand, customers, competition), financial (quality of earnings, margins, working capital), and operational (team, systems, dependencies), alongside legal review. The goal is to verify what is actually true about the business, not what has been packaged.
What is a quality of earnings (QoE) analysis?
An analysis verifying that reported earnings are real, recurring, and correctly stated: revenue recognition, one-off items, margin sustainability, and the adjustments behind the EBITDA figure. Buyers commission one in diligence; well-prepared sellers commission their own first.
How long does due diligence take?
Confirmatory diligence on a mid-market deal typically runs four to ten weeks, depending on the company's preparedness. Sellers who have done readiness work move materially faster and lose less value in the process.
What is sell-side or vendor due diligence?
Diligence the seller commissions on their own business before going to market: finding and fixing the issues a buyer would otherwise discover and price. It shortens processes, protects valuations, and signals seriousness to buyers.
How do diligence findings affect the deal?
Through terms: price adjustments where risk is real, earnouts or holdbacks where uncertainty needs bridging, and representations and warranties where facts need standing behind. Diligence that does not translate into terms protects no one.
You won't find our deals online. That is the point.
We do not publicise mandates, name clients, or announce transactions. The best outcomes are reached quietly, and confidentiality protects the seller, the process, and the price.
Confidential by default
A sale is the client's business, not our marketing. The market learns only what serves the client.
Selective by mandate
We take a limited number of companies and turn the rest down. Selectivity is the product, not a constraint on it.
Vetted and verified
If we represent a company, it is proven to be one of the best in its category, with a clear opportunity for the right buyer.
Diligencing a target, or preparing to be diligenced?
Tell us the situation. We'll give you an honest read on where the risks sit and whether we're the right firm to run the work.
We take a limited number of mandates. Request a conversation if:
- Your company is in the $10m to $100m+ enterprise value range
- You operate in or adjacent to our four sectors
- You want an honest read, not a flattering one