Bass Zanjani, Managing Director, leads M&A Advisory and owns the mandate from the first meeting through close. The file is not handed to an associate once the engagement letter is signed.

A written checkpoint at the end of each phase, and a standing call on a cadence agreed at kickoff. The pipeline is a document rather than a memory, so every name carries the reason it advanced or stopped.

Do we have to run a retained search?

No. Opportunistic screening and a retained search mandate are two routes, and the choice is made with you after the deployment view exists. Screening one in-market opportunity properly is a legitimate engagement on its own.

What does the market intelligence work cover?

Where capital can work in the subsector, where returns have been weak or losses common, what comparable assets transacted on, and whether the value-creation plan is supported by observed drivers. It is used to set and challenge the thesis before outreach starts, and it does not replace diligence on the specific company.

Is Technology & AI included in the mandate?

No. It is a separate practice with its own engagement letter, scoped when the questions arise. Most buy-side mandates never trigger it. When they do, the technology lead receives the thesis and the diligence questions we have already developed rather than starting from a blank brief.

It depends on the mandate and it is agreed in writing before work starts. We do not publish fees on this website, because the terms belong in the engagement letter rather than in marketing copy.

How is our information handled?

Under the confidentiality terms in the engagement letter. We do not disclose that a client is in the market, and on a retained search no target is told who is behind the outreach until the client instructs it.

BUY-SIDE ADVISORY

Deploy capital with evidence.

We begin with private-market intelligence to identify where capital can work, where risk is rising, and where the return evidence is weak. We then source and filter opportunities through in-market deal flow shared with CCA and through retained, proprietary search mandates; run Financial Due Diligence; and bring in Technology & AI diligence when the asset's systems, data, cybersecurity, or AI affect the investment case.

Discuss your investment thesis See the acquisition journey

PRIVATE-MARKET INTELLIGENCE, BEFORE CAPITAL IS COMMITTED

Know where capital can work, and where it should not go.

Most buy-side conversations start with a target. This one starts earlier, with the capital-allocation question. Before any outreach, we ground the acquisition thesis in granular private-market evidence: which subsectors fit the mandate, which environments carry low returns or elevated downside, what a relevant peer set transacted on, and which assumptions would otherwise set the price unchallenged.

The point is not to sell access to a data platform or to produce a market report. The point is to deploy capital more deliberately, and to know before the search begins which parts of the thesis the evidence does not support.

Intelligence informs the mandate. The mandate directs sourcing. Diligence validates the specific asset. Technology & AI tests the operating reality underneath the financial model. Benchmark context supports that analysis and does not constitute an automated recommendation, replace diligence, or guarantee investment performance.

FOUR CAPITAL-DEPLOYMENT QUESTIONS

The four questions we answer before a target list exists.

Where should we deploy capital?

Identify the subsectors whose growth, return, and risk profile fit the investment mandate, rather than following a broad category or whatever has been trading recently.

Market maps, invested capital, deal activity, return patterns, and loss context.

Where are returns weak or risks elevated?

Surface lower-return, loss-prone, or cyclical environments early enough to change the capital-allocation thesis or the underwriting hurdle, rather than discovering them in the third month of outreach.

Loss and recovery measures, return dispersion, cyclicality, and downside patterns.

Which assets are truly comparable, and what should we pay?

Establish a relevant peer context around business model and subsector economics before a target list or an entry valuation becomes fixed and everything after it is argued against the wrong benchmark.

Entry valuation, leverage, entry margins, revenue and EBITDA growth, and subsector filters.

Will the value-creation plan hold?

Separate a thesis supported by observed drivers from one that depends on multiple expansion nobody can account for or on operating improvement the sector has rarely delivered.

Value-creation bridge, growth against margin contribution, and winning-deal analysis.

SOURCING FOLLOWS INTELLIGENCE

Two sourcing routes, chosen with you.

Intelligence does not replace deal origination. It makes origination more disciplined by clarifying what we should pursue, what we should filter out, and which questions have to be answered before a target advances.

Opportunistic deal screening

You receive, or CCA is offered, an in-market opportunity that may fit the thesis.

Compare the opportunity against the capital-deployment view, screen it for relevance, and determine whether it merits deeper Financial Due Diligence. A screen that ends in a stop decision is worth as much as one that advances, and it costs a fraction of the diligence it prevents.

A reasoned advance, defer, or stop decision, with the key questions attached.

Retained search mandate

You want a proprietary target universe and direct outreach against a defined thesis.

Build the target universe, originate proprietary deal flow through direct CCA outreach including owners who were not planning to sell, maintain a live pipeline, and document why each target advances or stops.

A written mandate, a named target universe, a live pipeline, and documented outreach rationale.

FINANCIAL DUE DILIGENCE

Validate the earnings before anything is priced.

Financial Due Diligence follows the sourcing and screening decision. Its job is to test whether the asset's reported economics support the thesis the intelligence work produced, on this company rather than on the subsector average.

The output is not a diligence report filed for the record. It is a revised view of valuation and structure, and a list of specific issues that have to be priced into the deal before price or structure is fixed.

Revenue and earnings quality

How the company earns its revenue, what is cash against non-cash, and which reported EBITDA is defensible under a buyer's own definition.

Recurring against non-recurring

What renews, what was one-time and presented as ongoing, and what a buyer can underwrite as durable.

Customer concentration

Where the revenue sits, what the contracts say about it, and what happens to the model if the largest account leaves.

Cash conversion and working capital

The gap between reported earnings and cash, and the working-capital need the business carries into the next growth phase.

Synergy assumptions

The factual basis for every synergy in the model, built from the target's own numbers rather than from a percentage assumption.

See how CCA assesses the technology underneath the financial model

TECHNOLOGY DILIGENCE

The deliberate pivot to Technology & AI.

Technology diligence follows Financial Due Diligence as a decision, not a footnote. Where systems, data, cybersecurity, AI, software architecture, integration complexity, or technology debt affect the quality or durability of the earnings, the questions go to the Technology & AI practice and the Assess track.

Technology & AI is separately scoped. A buy-side mandate does not require it, and a technology assessment does not require an M&A mandate. Where it is relevant, the technology lead receives the investment thesis and the diligence questions CCA has already developed, so the client is not briefing a disconnected consultant halfway through a live deal.

Technology or data supports recurring revenue, scalability, or a core value-creation claim

PRISM technology due diligence and an AI and data readiness assessment.

Tests whether the operating model and the growth assumptions are supportable.

Cybersecurity, privacy, compliance, or resilience risk could create downside

Pre-close cybersecurity and control assessment.

Identifies risk that affects price, indemnities, remediation cost, or the willingness to proceed.

Integration, modernization, or operating-platform investment is assumed in the thesis

A hundred-day technology roadmap and an initial value-creation plan.

Prices capital expenditure, expected EBITDA drag or improvement, timing, and accountability after close.

See Technology & AI Assess

INVESTMENT DECISION AND EXECUTION

One investment case, built from what was found.

Market, financial, and technology findings come back to a single investment case rather than three parallel workstreams the client has to reconcile. Every material issue is translated into something the transaction can carry: price, structure, a diligence priority, an indemnity, escrow, or a walk-away.

We manage the process end to end through documentation and close, because circumstances change quickly enough to derail a deal that is left to drift. Issues found in diligence become price adjustments and terms in the negotiation rather than surprises in the final week.

The evidence base supports a decision that can be defended to an investment committee. It never replaces target-specific facts or the terms that get negotiated.

WHO THIS IS FOR

Five situations this mandate is built for.

Private equity funds

A defined mandate and a hurdle to clear, with more capital to deploy than proprietary deal flow to deploy it into.

For private equity

Independent sponsors

A thesis and a target, needing the underwriting and the diligence to be credible to the capital partners backing the deal.

For sponsors

Family offices

Direct and co-investment into operating companies, where the office wants the diligence discipline of a fund without building the team.

For family offices

Search funds

One acquisition that has to be the right one, where a stop decision made early is worth more than a broad pipeline.

Foreign investors

Capital entering the United States market, needing a local read on where it can work and what the structure has to account for.

DELIVERABLES

What you receive.

A capital-deployment view and a market map
A written investment mandate and the underwriting constraints
A named target universe
A screened opportunity pipeline, with advance and stop rationale on every name
A Financial Due Diligence view, with issues priced into the valuation
A Technology & AI diligence handoff, where the systems affect the case
A negotiated transaction, from term sheet through documentation and close
First-hundred-days priorities built from the findings, not from a template

HONEST ANSWERS

Before you send the thesis.

Who owns the file?: Bass Zanjani, Managing Director, leads M&A Advisory and owns the mandate from the first meeting through close. The file is not handed to an associate once the engagement letter is signed.
What is the cadence?: A written checkpoint at the end of each phase, and a standing call on a cadence agreed at kickoff. The pipeline is a document rather than a memory, so every name carries the reason it advanced or stopped.
Do we have to run a retained search?: No. Opportunistic screening and a retained search mandate are two routes, and the choice is made with you after the deployment view exists. Screening one in-market opportunity properly is a legitimate engagement on its own.
What does the market intelligence work cover?: Where capital can work in the subsector, where returns have been weak or losses common, what comparable assets transacted on, and whether the value-creation plan is supported by observed drivers. It is used to set and challenge the thesis before outreach starts, and it does not replace diligence on the specific company.
Is Technology & AI included in the mandate?: No. It is a separate practice with its own engagement letter, scoped when the questions arise. Most buy-side mandates never trigger it. When they do, the technology lead receives the thesis and the diligence questions we have already developed rather than starting from a blank brief.
How is this priced?: It depends on the mandate and it is agreed in writing before work starts. We do not publish fees on this website, because the terms belong in the engagement letter rather than in marketing copy.
How is our information handled?: Under the confidentiality terms in the engagement letter. We do not disclose that a client is in the market, and on a retained search no target is told who is behind the outreach until the client instructs it.

Discuss your investment thesis

Start with the thesis, not with a target list.

Tell us what you are trying to deploy into: the sector or subsector, the return you need, the risk you will not carry, and whether you want in-market screening or a retained search. We will tell you what we think the evidence says and what the first month looks like.

Bass reads every brief. If the thesis is one we cannot help with, we will say so rather than take the mandate.

Discuss your investment thesis