On Monday, February 3, Social Starts and Joyance Partners collaborated with Jones Day Law Firm to provide a seminar on the fundamentals of Mergers and Acquisitions. This seminar was exclusive to the Joyance and Social Starts portfolio companies and focused on strategy and planning for getting acquired.
The first panel addressed general legal M&A topics. Jones Day partners Kevin Espinola, Aarthi Belani, and Ka-on Li discussed board and corporate-level considerations and IP preparedness, followed by an explanation of employee benefits and compensation lead by partners Dean Bachus and Allison Crow.
Neil Shroff, Managing Director of Orion Capital Group, Adjunct at Stanford teaching M&A Strategy and Execution, and advisor to Social Starts and Joyance Partners, gave guidance to the audience on “How to get your Startup Acquired,” including pointers for creating an attractive company, identifying likely acquirers, and running the company after an exit.
At noon, special guest Head of M&A Software Strategy at IBM Deborah Magrid joined the conversation to share the story of how she arrived at her current role and give insight into the buyer’s perspective.
The third panel addressed regulatory, IP, and cybersecurity considerations specifically for life sciences, digital health, and med-tech companies. Topics included FDA and healthcare regulations, with discussions led by Jones Day associate Ian Pearson and partner Daniel A. Cody. Partner Jennifer Everett shared advice regarding privacy and cybersecurity considerations, followed by an overview of AI patent protection trends for life and medical sciences from partner Carl Kukkonen. The event ended with a comprehensive presentation from Partner Alexis Gilroy regarding ways to align regulatory compliance with your business model to make it an asset and not just a cost.
We’d like to extend a huge thanks to Jones Day and our guest speakers for taking the time to share their expertise with us. We truly value our network of knowledgeable and accomplished colleagues - we’re thrilled to be able to leverage opportunities like this to support our companies on their journeys to success, and look forward to many more in the future.
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