According to a survey of EMEA M&A professionals conducted by Merrill Corporation, artificial intelligence and machine learning (46%) and predictive analytics (37%) as the technologies that will have the most long-term transformative impact on M&A due diligence. Notably, however, blockchain technology was not identified as a technology with a transformative role.
Merrill Corporation is a SaaS provider for professionals in the deal-making community. A total of 539 M&A professionals from Europe, Africa and the Middle East (EMEA) were surveyed by Merrill Corporation and Euromoney in July 2018. The data gathered from the survey informed the DueDiligence2022 report.
More than any other factor, 32% of those surveyed said that being able to harness the information with data analytics technologies would most help in accelerating the due diligence process. Over the next five years, EMEA M&A professionals expect technology to change the due diligence process by providing greater security (63%), supporting deeper analytical capabilities (61%), and simplifying the entire process (45%).
Other findings showed that the implementation of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) stood out as a major hurdle for mergers and acquisitions, with more than half of respondents (55%) citing the compliance and data protection employed by the target company as a primary reason a transaction did not progress. Additionally, 66% of those surveyed believe that GDPR will increase acquirers’ scrutiny of the data protection policies and processes of target companies, further complicating the deal-making process.