Intralinks' New M&A Workflow Connects Shared Processes
Intralinks, the virtual data room (VDR) provider, has introduced its new M&A Workflow capabilities to significantly streamline the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) process. The initial use case being rolled out leveraging M&A Workflow helps advisors and corporate development professionals obtain secure cross-organizational document approvals much more quickly than was previously possible.
The new capability is built on Intralinks' next generation microservices technology platform and is intended for business user configuration and use.
"The M&A Workflow feature significantly expedites one of the bigger roadblocks in the diligence process and serves as a key building block in Intralinks' mission to deploy automated workflow configurations tailored to support complete M&A-specific use cases," said Leif O'Leary , CEO of Intralinks.
"Ultimately, our goal is to remove as many variables as possible from the dealmaking process and provide our customers with the most efficient, stable, secure and worry-free environment in which to do business. Automating repeatable tasks that occur throughout a transaction process and enhancing deal preparation is the first step in that mission."
Securely sharing highly sensitive documents and files in a VDR is a critical part of the M&A process. Getting appropriate approvals for those files, especially across organizations, traditionally has been done via email, which inherently increases the risk of sensitive information being leaked and makes it difficult to ensure proper protocols are being followed.
Intralinks M&A Workflow automates the approval process for documents within the secure VDR platform, solves version control issues and allows users to track the status of documents that are being processed.
In addition to expediting the deal preparation process, the M&A Workflow tool enables users to:
- Track all activity through a dashboard that provides a consolidated, real-time view of task requests in process
- Comment in a single, secure conversation thread related to the documents as opposed to multiple emails
- Create an archive of cross-organizational document approvals
- Control the entire process within the application
- Access content on mobile devices