European Special Bank - Digital / IT Due Diligence

During intensive M&A considerations, a special bank with a market presence in European countries had been in focus.

Due to the importance of IT in this business and to better evaluate the future potential for specific strategic scenarios, a digital / IT due diligence was performed. This exercise was performed while further due diligence assessments and valuation discussions were ongoing in parallel.

The goal of the project was to perform a digital / IT due diligence considering the following key points in particular:

• Understand the strengths and weaknesses of the current IT setup (organization, governance, processes, architecture, sourcing, project portfolio)
• Understand the strengths and weaknesses in the digital business model regarding technology and digital / IT operating model aspects
• Compare the corporation against common digital / IT benchmarks and digital / IT key metrics
• Identify potential risks ("red flags")

The following approach has been taken to perform the digital / IT due diligence:

• Settings session with the M&A team and defining a wish list for the data room
• Analysis of the provided documents in the data room
• Interviews with nominated stakeholders
• Site visit and walkthrough sessions with company representatives
• Compilation of the draft version of the digital / IT due diligence report
• Review and discussion with the M&A team and further stakeholders to agree on steps for eventual remaining topics
• Final activities and finalization of the digital / IT due diligence report

The project length for performing the digital / IT due diligence was approximately 8 weeks.