Posts By: Joel Lessem
Joel Lessem, CEO and Co-Founder
As Chief Executive Officer, Joel Lessem is responsible for leading Firmex’s strategy and growth. Joel has over 18 years’ experience in successfully accelerating revenues of growth businesses. Under his leadership, Firmex is rapidly becoming a standard for sharing large volumes of highly confidential and sensitive documents for corporate transactions, litigation and compliance.
Prior to leading Firmex, Joel drove the US growth of PointForce Inc., leading to the company’s acquisition in 2004. In 1999, Joel co-founded Crescent Logic, a software company that provided online equity research publishing tools for investment banks.
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Jan 17, 2012 - by Joel Lessem
Today we enjoyed an in-depth outlook of the M&A Market in 2012 with Dennis Roberts, author, Chairman and CEO at The McLean Group. His insights into how cross-border deals, technology, healthcare and an aging baby boomer population are affecting the M&A landscape, were invaluable.
Dennis spoke to the impact of new technologies on business, citing that 40% of S&P 500 companies were not there 10 years ago. He also discussed how an aging baby boomer population has accelerated growth in healthcare, pharma and biotech. He also referenced specific data related to the last year, revealing that in 2011, one in three M&A transactions in the U.S. were cross border deals.
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Dec 9, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
Today we enjoyed our fourth collaborative Master Class with Andrew J. Sherman, author and Partner at Jones Day. He led us through his best practices to ensure success in post-close integration with a Buy-Side perspective of M&A.
Andrew spoke to the challenges in post-close integration. Citing at KPMG survey, Sherman agreed that cultural and people issues present the biggest challenge during the post deal period. He also referenced specific data points related to post-deal integration, citing a Deloitte survey Sherman highlighted that although the desired outcome of integration may be to rapidly capture cost & revenue, synergies were not achieved in 70% of cases.
The news wasn't all bad though, Andrew provided tips, tricks and checklists for retaining key employees, overcoming cultural issues, establishing a transition team and more.
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Nov 18, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
Today, we once again enjoyed our third collaborative Master Class with Andrew J. Sherman, author and Partner at Jones Day. He led us through his due diligence best practices and pitfalls with a Buy-Side perspective of M&A.
Andrew likened the due diligence process in M&A to dating, "Some people like to disclose everything on a first date, most of us reveal information about ourselves on a phased basis as we get to know the other party. The due diligence process in M&A is more akin to that, as long as you're not witholding information that would change the nature of the transaction." Transparency and openness are keys to conducting successful due diligence. Sherman added that, "Those who are successful in due diligence leave their ego at the door."
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Oct 20, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
Today, we once again enjoyed an enthusiastic and collaborative session with Andrew J. Sherman, author and Partner at Jones Day. He took us through the Buy-Side perspective of M&A and focused on how to qualify your seller and uncover hidden value.
Building on his weather forecast in Part 1 of the series, Andrew alluded to the clouds parting for M&A in 2012. Using a bullhorn he gave the call to action to Buyers, “Attention K-mart shoppers – deals to be had!” Companies are sitting on $2.5 trillion and this value will be flowing back into the markets. Buyers need to be prepared to capitalize on the buyer’s market that currently exists but not to rush into acquisitions. Vigilant due diligence is crucial.
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Oct 18, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
Over the course of the last year, Firmex has made major investments in our product group. From deep talent hires to doubling our head count in development, to investing in SOC 2 audits and partnering with a content acceleration provider – we are serious about ensuring our customers enjoy a consistently high experience when it comes to working with Firmex.
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Oct 7, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
I have spoken to many entrepreneurs and intermediaries. Some of my peers in my CEO circle who are approached by a potential acquirer, are at times more focused on “what’s in it for me” versus their buyer’s mindset.
Bottom line is first you need to qualify your buyer. Once you’re satisfied you need to make sure you’re easy to deal with. This should not be a tug of war. It’s a courtship ending in a marriage!
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Sep 29, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
Recently I participated in the M&A Master Class webinar alongside Andrew J. Sherman, author and Partner at Jones Day. What an incredible opportunity to listen to a leading authority on M&A, up close and personal. This session took listeners through not only his views on the current state of the market but also key steps to prepare for selling a company. The slides to his presentation are posted on the Firmex website, but I thought I would re-iterate his views on the current state of the market, which he took us through in our conversation.
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Aug 4, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
One of my favourite books is Billion Dollar Lessons by Paul Carroll and Chunka Mui. The book is distilled from researching 2,500 significant business failures. The authors describe:
The extent of the failures was stunning. Since 1981, 423 U.S. companies with assets of more than $500 million filed for bankruptcy. Their combined assets at the time of their bankruptcy filings totaled more than $1.5 trillion....Their combined annual revenue was almost $830 billion.
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Jul 19, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
The Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) business model of internet-based software has already transformed the way we manage our personal lives and analysts continue to predict that SaaS will further revolutionize the workplace for several key reasons:
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Jun 23, 2011 - by Joel Lessem
M&A activity in the US continued to pick up pace in the first half of 2011 and is expected to pick up steadily during the second half of the year, according to the PwC US Mid-Year M&A Outlook 2011. The PwC report reviewed the last 12 months, and insights I took from it aligned well with a recent analysis by Firmex that reviewed the last 24 months of Data room usage and 2011 M&A trends. Our report showed a 43% growth in data room usage by M&A advisory firms, which is a good leading indicator for future M&A deals over the next six months.
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